If you sell a downloadable digital product such as an ebook or software, you already know about the risk of having your products stolen from your own download pages.

I read somewhere that it’s been estimated that more than 50% of all ebooks and software in use are copies that have been stolen, and most of those were stolen right from the merchant’s download page.

It makes me really angry to think of all the hard work that we put into product creation — only to have it stolen by some jerk without scruples.

Not only is it frustrating, but the loss can become very costly.

For example, even if only one book is stolen each day that would otherwise have been purchased for $47, that’s $17,155 per year that you don’t get to play with.

So… when I finally clued into the fact that my book was being downloaded for free by thieves, I got smart and got a download protector.

I use a product called DLGuard to protect my Super Affiliate Handbook and other digital information and software products from being downloaded for free by thieves (who unfortunately ABOUND on the ‘net), and have been absolutely thrilled with both it and the service that Sam Stephens provides.

On the DLGuard site, Harvey Segal comments, “The last time I tried to implement a download management solution I gave up after page 42 of a huge complex manual. With DLGuard it was ridiculously easy to install and then to run. Add to that Sam’s superb customer support and constant innovation and it’s an easy decision to purchase.”

What can I say but “ditto, ditto, and ditto”… and that was WITH technical support!

Sam’s system is easy to install, and better yet, if you have script installation phobias like I do, Sam is always right there to lend a helping hand… barring a bit of a time lag seeing that he’s on the other side of the planet.

Here is a screenshot from one of my DLGuard installations that shows the Adminstration Panel.

Product features include:

• Secure single product sales
• Built-in shopping cart
• Create Membership sites
• Expiring download links
• Limit download attempts
• Offer promotional coupons
• Calculates sales conversion rates automatically
• Template based for easy customisation
• Automatic mailing list sign-up
• Integrated with the major payment systems

DLGuard is also fully integrated with the following payment systems:

• Paypal
• Clickbank
• 2CO
• WorldPay
• Authorize.net
• AlertPay
• PayDotCom
• eBay
• e-Gold

This is truly one great script and a MUST-HAVE for anyone who sells digital information products and software online.

Check out the DLGuard site right now and start protecting your products from thieves today.

Lance Tien and Jamie Lewis approached me a couple of times to promote their copyNprofit program – the overall premise of which is that buyers can copy and paste one or more of their successful Google Adwords campaigns.

I took a quick look at their sales page and because I thought the copy (and videos) could mislead those who are new to affiliate marketing, I chose not to buy or review it.

However, after seeing all the hoopla and hype delivered about copyNprofit over the last few weeks, I thought it best to investigate further, so I bought copyNprofit today, thoroughly investigated the product and what follows is my review of the copyNprofit system.

copyNprofit Sales Pitch

Let’s start with that copyNprofit sales page which opens with…

Copy the exact campaigns that make up to $94,133 in 30 days on autopilot.

You won’t need to “learn” anything …. Just COPY these. No margin for error… just a template that’s already profitable for you to duplicate.

The “no need to learn anything” theme continues again down the page with…

“Stop trying to give me a fishing pole, just give me the fish – seriously!”

Well, seriously, I could go off on a lengthy tangent here about how trying to debunk “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime” is just plain wrong — but anyone with half a brain and a modicum of life experience understands the truth in this old Chinese proverb.

But there are more problematic issues still…

In the video on the salespage, Jamie answers prospective buyers’ most common questions including (and I’m paraphrasing) – “If everyone copies these campaigns will they work any longer?” and “Do I have to spend money?“.

Jamie’s answers are “Absolutely” and “No!” and where I take serious issue with the copyNprofit sales pitch.

Let’s look at the second question first. The product is about copying successful PPC campaigns. PPC advertising costs money. Yet Jamie says that you don’t have to spend money because you can still use the program using other techniques (such as article marketing).

Well, let’s just say that the teaching of those other techniques is scant at best.

copyNprofit Contents

For example, the 44-page ‘manual’ included with the course describes – in one paragraph – how affiliate marketing works and then summarizes as follows:

1. You post an ad promoting a product
2. Someone visits your ad, clicks & buys the product
3. You get a commission!

The “Learn Affiliate Marketing” video is likewise short – barely 2 minutes in length. (You’ll get a much better overview from my “How Affiliate Marketing Works” video which is free to view.

Speaking of videos – Most of the videos in the copyNprofit are very short in duration and the screen size is too small to properly see the application being explained. On occasion, you are directed back to the manual for more information on the Google Keywords Tool, but when I searched the manual for that information, not only was it never mentioned by name, but there was no link to it.

OK, so the product is (in my humble opinion) definitely not suitable for someone who is brand-new to affiliate marketing – but what about someone who understands how affiliate marketing works and is just looking for profitable niches?

Well, let’s go back to the first question answered on the video – “If everyone copies these campaigns will they work any longer?“

copyNprofit Niche Evaluation

There are 38 niche products inside the copyNprofit package listed under 8 categories that include Society & Culture, Weight Loss, Computing & Internet, etc.

I immediately hopped to one of two product recommendations that was most applicable to my primary niche – online dating. (To be fair, I can’t say exactly which product it is – let’s just say that I’m very familiar with the topic and product).

The copyNprofit interface promises $49.00 per sale on this particular product.

Here are the numbers from the Clickbank interface for that product:

$/sale: $16.71 | Future $: – | Total $/sale: $16.71 | %/sale: 70.0% | %refd: 66.0% | grav: 23.87

As nothing is listed under Future earnings this is a ONE-time sale – NOT recurring… so I don’t know how they figure $49.00 in earnings per sale.

Regardless, I set up the campaign as recommended – 50 cents per click, a budget of $30.00/day targeted at Canada, Australia, the U.K. and the U.S. and ran it through the Google Traffic estimator.

Here’s what was returned.

I’d be spending 2 – $5 a day for 4 – 9 clicks given the keywords provided because the search volume is so low. Assuming a 2% conversion rate, it might take 50 clicks to garner a sale at a cost of $25.

Spend $25.00 to earn $16.71. Hmmmm…

Because I like to run volume and use up my set daily budget to test a campaign properly, I tested until I found a campaign that promised to deliver enough clicks to exhaust the budget.

Then I ran the campaign through Google Cash Detective and counted the number of campaigns for the primary keyword.

There were 113 campaigns!!!!!!!!!

OK, granted not all those campaigns are running right now. However, that fact in itself is pretty telling — MOST of the campaigns for those keywords had only run for a day or two and then been suspended, indicating really low profit potential. Moreover, the ONLY campaigns that indicated serious profitability were those running by the Clickbank merchant themselves.

Too, consider this.

If there are a multitude of Adwords ads direct linking to the same destination URL, the ads will be rotated… and yours will be rotated out of view because Google doesn’t like “thin affiliates” – those that direct link to merchants and provide no additional value to visitors.

What happens to “thin affiliates”? They are charged MORE for their Adwords Ads. Instead of 50 cents, you could get charged $5.00 a click or even 10 bucks a click.

So, now that both questions are answered honestly… here are my copyNprofit summary findings

copyNprofit Review Summary

For anyone wanting to learn affiliate marketing from scratch, this $77 one-technique wonder product is NOT the answer. You’d be MUCH better off investing $47 in the Super Affiliate Handbook which is the industry’s standard training manual for new affiliates and actually teaches affiliate marketing techniques from the ground up.

However, for more advanced affiliate marketers, I’ll say this…

I was surprised by some of the niche market products that I found listed in copyNprofit. From that standpoint alone, copyNprofit is worth $77, ’cause we both know that you’ll make your money back in no time flat with a relatively untapped market and product — and it would cost you more than that in time to find that niche on your own.

Click here to learn more about copyNprofit.

“… still the best autoresponder service available – bar none.”

If you’ve been searching for a service that will let you build a list of subscribers, deliver auto-response messages and send broadcast news to those subscribers, then you already know that there are many different options from which to choose.

You may be finding it difficult to choose, so… I’m going to make your choice simple.

Get an Aweber autoresponder.

I have been using Aweber’s autoresponder service since 1998. For comparison purposes only, I’ve tested many of the other autoresponder services available and have ultimately cancelled all but Aweber’s service.

With Aweber, you get everything you need to build your email marketing campaign at a reasonable price.

Unlimited Autoresponders, Broadcast & Followup Messages

These are the most basic benefits of having an Aweber autoresponder account:

• Unlimited autoresponders so you can set build a different for list for each of your sites or pay per click campaigns.
• Unlimited follow up messages. You can have something as short as a 5-part autoresponder series or build one that delivers a message to your subscriber every week for a year… or longer. It’s up to you.
• Unlimited braodcast messages lets you share news with your subscribers on an ad-hoc basis.
• Unlimited message length. There are some services that restrict the amount of text you can send.

In addition to support, the Aweber guys frequently blog and write articles about email marketing topics such as “Just Because We Publish, Doesn’t Mean You Read” and “Confirmed Opt-in Myths Exposed“.

Personalization, Shopping Cart Integration and more…

The features that you get with Aweber’s service is too extensive to list in this article, but here are few:

• Your messages can be personalized to include your subscriber’s name.
• Send your messages using text, HTML or both — and you can choose from a number of pre-designed HTML templates.
• A WYSIWYG editor is available for the HTML challenged.
• Click-through and open rates are tracked automatically.
• You can send attachments such as ebooks or PDF’s along with your messages.
• Aweber is easily integrated with Paypal and other third-party shopping carts.
• Free customer support via phone, live chat or ticket submission. This is one of the few autoresponder services that has support available on the weekends – and their support is fabulous — they actually answer the question that you asked!

Aweber makes it easy for you to start using their system as well, with free training videos that show you how to do everything on a step-by-step basis.

Creating your opt-in form is as simple as navigating to the “Web Form” section, filling in 4 form blanks and selecting one radio button. All you have to do then is copy and paste the code where you want it on your site.

Pricing

You will have no trouble covering the cost of the service as your list grows.

As a matter of fact, I’m thrilled each time my bill increases, because I know that I now have MORE subscribers and am therefore making much MORE money!

So, as I’ve been telling new Internet marketers and webmasters for years — with more features and lower prices, Aweber is still the best autoresponder service available – bar none.

Visit the Aweber site now to learn more…

Build large, effective PPC campaigns incredibly fast

Updated / added July 23rd, 2010…

Since its release in 2008, the SpeedPPC campaign builder has developed into a very advanced piece of software. Most important for those who are just getting started with PPC, they have written an extensive guide that will allow you to understand the intricacies of the software and the different functionality that it possesses.

SpeedPPC is best PPC campaign building tool bar none that works with not only all the major PPC companies like Google, Yahoo! and MSN/Bing, but also all the 2nd tier ones.

I finally spent some time over the weekend playing with Speed PPC by Jay Stockwell, a qualified Adwords professional.

After about 2 hours of reading and hitting different combinations of radio buttons (and building a few campaigns (into which I’d put too many keywords and ad groups for the Google Adwords Editor to accept), I finally built a small 672-keyword U.S. state-related campaign using only 3 base keywords and the U.S. state expansion list. It took only seconds to generate the outputs and all were uploaded to Google Adwords via my Google Adwords Editor a few minutes later.

Other “Expansion lists” included with Speed PPC are US city names, Australian city names, Australian suburb names, UK town names, top 1000 movie names, top 1000 music artists, top 1000 actors, top 300 Xbox games, top 300 Xbox 360 games, top 300 PS2 games, top 300 PS3 games, cell phone model names, car model names, motorcycle model names, perfumes, cosmetics, digital camera model names, video camera model names, router model names, laptop model names, printer model names, and occupations.

Compared to how I used to build state-related campaigns using an Excel spreadsheet, Speed PPC was very swift both in terms of speed and ease. Better yet, the resulting search to ad display relevancy is MUCH much better.

For example, if someone searches for “New York Singles” not only will your ad title be “New York Singles”, but Jay also teaches you how to modify your landing pages to display the same phrase.

Although I did not try out the “Affiliate Datafeed Landing Page Generator” software that is included in the package, I imagine that for pure search affiliates who use huge product datafeeds and want to track the efficacy of their campaigns down to the model name, this piece would be very helpful indeed.

In summary, once the software has been mastered, Speed PPC is a worthwhile tool for experienced search marketers who want to quickly build BIG, highly relevant campaigns which result in higher quality scores and lower ad costs.

Although Speed PPC is pretty pricey at the posted price of $497, Jay has offered my readers a 20% discount ($397) and there is a 60-day money back guarantee.

Build large, effective PPC campaigns incredibly fast…

If you’re a dyed-in-the-wool search marketer, or better yet, a content publisher who uses PPC marketing to drive traffic, I’d say give it a shot and set aside a morning to build some of those new campaigns you’ve been thinking about doing over the holidays. A well-versed pay per click advertiser should be able to recoup their Speed PPC investment in fairly short order.

How do you choose the products you buy? Do you simply accept as gospel truth all the good things a merchant says about their own product? Or, do you ask your friends’ opinions and look for independent product reviews before opening your wallet?

If you’re a savvy consumer (which of course you are), then you put more stock in your friends’ opinions and independent product reviews.

As affiliate marketers, we become much more successful when we approach our site visitors as friends and take the attitude that they too are savvy consumers.

From that standpoint, an affiliate’s real work is to pre-sell our merchant partners’ products by writing fair and balanced reviews, also known as endorsement letters.

Sure, writing a review for each product takes a little time and effort, but it’s an activity that sets the super affiliates apart from their less-super counterparts in terms of rewards… read ‘income’.

Product reviews can be either stand-alone or comparative. The first type focuses on a single product, while the second is an evaluation of similar items that allows readers to choose which product best suits them.

Before you begin to write a product review, you’ll need to evaluate the product. (Nothing like stating the obvious, eh?)

I prefer to endorse products that I’ve actually used. However, buying a product isn’t always feasible. If that’s the case, affiliate managers will often grant ‘proven’ super-affiliates access to products for their review. That’s especially true of information products and services that are delivered online, such as internet dating services.

But what if you’re not yet a super affiliate, and can’t fathom a basement full of treadmills to review for your exercise site?

Well, do what your customer would do if product reviews didn’t exist on the Internet – go to the store and test those treadmills out!

And how do you review acne medications for your skin care site if you don’t have acne? Surely, you have some friends with (previously) pimply-faced teenagers… ask them to tell you what worked for them.

If you can’t find out that way, search Google for “consumer reviews” + “acne medications”. Read as many as you can to come up with three to five effective products (that have affiliate programs).

Once you’ve collected information about the product, it’s time to start writing that product review.

The structure for a product review is simple, containing an introduction, overview and summary.

The introduction consists of a few sentences outlining the problem and introduces a possible solution for the reader, without going into detail. The overview describes the product’s promise, a description of how the product is used, as well as its effectiveness and value. The summary is almost a repeat of the introduction, and contains a strong recommendation for purchase based on your conclusions.

To simplify the review-writing process, I ask myself the following questions when writing product reviews for my own affiliate sites.

1. Who is my reader and what is their problem?
2. What does the product promise?
3. How well does the product solve the problem? What does it do? How does it work?
4. Does the product offer good value? (Would I buy this product?)

Let’s look at each question in turn.

The first question asks, “Who is my reader and what is their problem?”

If acne is your reader’s problem and your site visitors are adults, you probably want to avoid terminology like ‘Zap those zits!’ and use more age-appropriate language.

Remember too, that ‘zits’ aren’t really the problem. The real problem is how your reader feels about having pimples all over their face and how that affects their life.

If you’ve experienced the problem yourself, say so. Describe your experience, and show understanding and compassion for the reader’s plight. Speaking from real experience earns your readers’ trust which always improves sales rates.

If you have trouble figuring out how your reader might be affected by his problem, then you can research that online too.

For example, I searched Google for “hate acne” and came across Acne.org, where one young woman lamented, “My sh%tty skin is seriously ruining my social life and my relationships with men. I’m avoiding it all just cuz I don’t want to show my face. Its really sad. I also spend a lot of money on make up. I’m not even asking for the most perfect skin (even though it would be nice) but even if I was limited to just a couple zits….and then it would take me under 30 mins to get ready….I would never be home, and I would go back to living the life that I ohh so miss.”

That gives you a pretty clear picture of how she feels, right?

Now address those concerns using emotive terms and you’ll improve your conversion rates.

Here’s an example.

Rather than say, “Product A will cure your acne”, start with a question that appeals to your reader’s emotion, such as “Is acne ruining your social life? Scared to leave the house – or even show your face? There IS a solution to your plight.”

That introduction brings us to the next question which is, ‘What does the product promise?’

Does the product cure the problem? Does it work faster, or with less hassle and expense?

You found answers to that question during your product research. In this section you simply summarize your findings.

Next, answer the third set of questions, “How well does the product solve the problem?”, “what does it do?” and “how does it work?” based on your product research.

Results are the most important information, so it’s not necessary to provide nitty gritty details about how you use the product or what it’s made of or how it is packaged, etc. unless the merchant does not supply that information on their site, and you consider the information of importance to your reader.

Too, we’re all aware that no product is perfect, so don’t go overboard and write a completely glowing, one-sided review. To make the product review balanced and fair, detail what you do and don’t like about the product. If you want to avoid negative statements when outlining your dislikes, try phrasing the sentence like “although I’d prefer a slightly less greasy formula…” or “although the bottle lacks a pump dispenser…” and finish on a positive note.

Lastly, make a value statement. For example, “While Product A and B both eliminate most acne problems in 30 days, Product A wins our ‘best value’ award priced at $20 less per bottle. Or, if you’re writing a single product review, you could say something like, “Acme’s Acne Product would be great value even at twice the price, but at this price it can’t be beat!”

For even better conversions, be sure to include a product graphic on your product review webpage, and a testimonial or two from users that you solicit through your site or use with permission from your merchant partner’s site.

In summary, tell your visitors what you would say to a friend if you were telling them about a product that you found and liked. That approach will make writing reviews easier and your friendly attitude will push your conversion rates through the roof!

Product endorsements are great, but you’ll also want to put informative articles on your and other webmasters’ sites. With Jim and Dallas Edwards’ simple “Turn Words Into Traffic” system, your articles will soon be all over the Internet attracting visitors to your website like bees to honey… even if you think you can’t write.

Forget the Massive Spreadsheet…

Do you have trouble keeping track of every detail of your affiliate marketing business?

Well, there IS help!

Software developer, Jon Mills, has just released ‘Affiliate Organizer‘. On hearing about it, I immediately took it for a test drive.

The software was extremely easy to install and an icon appears in the bottom right-hand corner (the system tray) of your desktop making it really simple to access.

‘Affiliate Organizer’ allows you to store all your most important information from your day-to-day business.

Here’s a list of all the information you can input into ‘Affiliate Organizer‘:

• Hosting
• Websites
• Advertising ( ppc.. my favorite)
• Merchants
• Outsourced Work
• Adsense
• Tasks/Alerts ( This is a life saver )
• Projects and Ideas
• Keyword Lists
• Domain Registrars
• Forums
• Link Partners
• Blogs
• Year Plan ( this was cool.. plan everything out ahead of time)
• Services
• Training
• Resources
• Software ( anything you have purchased)
• Autoresponder
• Memberships
• Contacts

Everything is simple to use. Just fill in the blanks and save.. it couldn’t be much easier.. so a real thumbs up regarding how user friendly it is.

The tasks/alerts and advertising section is a real life saver.

I can setup any upcoming events in the tasks/alerts section and it will notify me both by email and on-screen. How cool is that?!

Everything can also be backed up and restored at the click of a button! So, no more lost data, which is a major relief for me… and anyone else who’s ever lost data before. :=)

Overall I was thoroughly impressed with the amount of detail that has been covered. John has covered all the bases with ‘Affiliate Organizer‘. I can’t think of a thing that needs to be added or changed.

Whether you do affiliate marketing or just want to keep track of the important aspects of your online business… I HIGHLY recommend you check out ‘Affiliate Organizer‘.

If you are as uncomfortable as I am with ‘black hat’ or ‘grey hat’ SEO techniques then Project Black Mask - the latest ‘tell all’ Adsense product for affiliate marketers – is definitely not for you.

Project Black Mask is the next-in-series of IM products by Chris X, the author of Day Job Killer, Affiliate Project X, and Adwords Miracle.

I read it about a week ago and quite frankly, there’s NO WAY I would take this approach to making an affiliate income. Seriously, why would anyone want to invest in 100′s or thousands of domains to make a dollar a day (probably less) on each through Adsense, when they can earn at least as much or more selling real products as a content publisher through just one, two or three sites?

Granted, the content publisher approach always appears to be too much like work for some folks – especially those who hate to write, don’t want to pay for PLR or ghostwriters, or have no time or inclination to build a list and create real relationships with newsletter subscribers.

If that describes your take on content publishing as an affiliate marketer, then perhaps Chris’ approach will seem like a godsend, but don’t say that I didn’t warn you about domain or software outlays or, if this technique eventually turns out to be another flash in the pan approach to affiliate marketing.

All that said, one section of Chris’ book that is worth it’s weight in gold is the keyword list generation chapter. He says, “I’m a keyword addict. I collect good keywords like a museum collects expensive paintings” and it’s obvious to this ‘keyword addict’ that Chris knows exactly what he’s talking about when it comes to keyword research and generation.

Chris tells you exactly how to build and use big beautiful lists of longtail keywords. It’s absolutely fabulous information and in my opinion, worth the price of admission, whether you’re into black hat SEO or a by-the-book white hat affiliate marketer like myself.

Visit Project Black Mask

To communicate on the Internet, you’ve got to write. To SELL on the Internet, you’ve got to… copywrite!

I feel like I’ve let you down…

Not entirely and certainly not on purpose.

You see, you’ve probably heard me talk about the importance of copywriting. The power of writing words on paper or on the computer screen and getting people to send you money (sometimes lots and lots of money). Of course, you know sales copy is important and I bet you even have a few resources on the subject.

Trust me, I’ve seen, read and studied just about everything under the sun when it comes to copywriting and I really didn’t think there could be anything new out there.

But I was wrong!

I bought Yanik Silver’s Ultimate ‘At-Home’ Internet Copywriting Workshop and it’s fabulous. I know that might sound like I’m being over the top – but this package is truly incredible.

Look, this is one of those times when I truly wish I could just grab your mouse and force you to click over to this page and check it out for yourself:

Yanik’s Ultimate ‘At-Home’ Internet Copywriting Workshop

I’m serious, it’s that good – and here’s why…

First off, the package is massive.

I talking over 30 lbs. 3 huge 3-ring binders, 12 DVDs, and a pile of CDs and extras. I’d estimate at least 1400 written pages of material. (You should have seen me trying to drag this sucker in from my porch)

But it’s not just bulk.

Yanik actually made my life easy because now whenever I want to sit down and write a kick- butt email, ad or sales letter – I can just flip right to the section I need. Everything is tabbed so you can quickly and easily find ‘swipe files’ for any sales copy you need. It feels like cheating! He’s put examples of every single thing you’d need for your Internet business (emails, pops, endorsements, web sites, headlines, guarantees, PPC ads, etc).

Truth is, I have just about every other copy course out there but this one sits right next to my desk!

The ‘proof is in the pudding …

Here’s a testimonial for Yanik Silver’s ‘Ultimate Copywriting Workshop‘

“…At first I was very skeptical that he could help us but I took a chance and was absolutely amazed at the results. We went from $1,200 a month to our highest month of $44,000 online in just 5 months. Thanks to his sales letter training we filled our Boot Camp, all 90 spaces (10 more than we wanted), in less than 3 weeks. People from all over the country, and even from Australia, are coming to attend. And, we have only ever written one sales letter to date for this one event!”

– Jon and Carol Tuttle, Sandy, UT

It doesn’t matter if you have your own product, sell other people’s product as an affiliate or whatever business you’re in – copywriting is by far the #1 skill you need to create more sales, more profits and more of just anything you ever want…simply using a pen or your keyboard.

Listen, it takes a whole lot to impress me and this product not only impressed me – it comes with my highest recommendation.

Others paid $3,975.00 for this information you’ll pay a fraction to…

…”Sneak Away With Every Single Trick, Tactic, Formula, Shortcut, Strategy and Jealously-Guarded Secret The Internet’s #1 Most-Celebrated Copywriter Uses to Create Huge Piles Of Cash At Will” Advanced Training

Check it out here:Yanik’s Ultimate ‘At-Home’ Internet Copywriting Workshop