• Many people in Asia are not comfortable writing in English.
• Writing is a tedious process because it is not usually a habit.
• It’s a tedious process to even generate good ideas for articles even if you can write.
• To submit completed articles is a barrier because you want maximum exposure, and submission is an administrative process that wastes time.
• Even if you do submit articles, you end up not really knowing which is the best category for you.
• There’s a gazillion different software that confuse rather than help leverage.

photo credit: Adam (adamjinj)

So how do you address this? Here’s my suggestion. First of all, you have to remember that article traffic can be done by you, but you don’t have to be the only person doing it yourself. Even if you’re proficient at writing, and you really want other people to do this so that you can automate the article marketing process.

Next, you need to hire people who are reliable. It’s a common sense question – how do I hire people to get this done for me without creating more work for myself? My suggestion is to split up the work. Instead of just hiring individuals, hire a team or company you can outsource to. This way, if there is any problem, it’s the company’s responsibility to ensure that the work of writing is completed.

Then it’s the process of submission. Get another group/team to submit your articles for you.

So, at this juncture, you probably think that it’s going to be hands off for you? Wrong. You should set up a checking system where another individual is hired to police the submissions and writing. If you can do this, it will definitely save you lots of time and effort while generating a huge amount of traffic.

I also know people who have bought submission tools for their team so that the team can be more efficient in submission work!

Why do I NOT recommend using the commercial approaches to article writing and submission? Well, because there are too many people who are using those services and I have no clue as to the quality no matter how many gurus recommend those services. Personally, I would rather set a private system for myself and let that be my own secret weapon, not need to share this with other people!

So, in summary, you need:

1. a team of writers
2. a team of submission grunge workers
3. a project manager to handle the tracking and supervision

Wow – isn’t that going to increase your costs?

Well, if you do this effectively, you will need to set a target in the first place. What is your goal? Is it to submit 100 articles in a month? Hmm.. here’s a calculation. You could do this at around $5 per article, meaning $500 a month.

So, you will need submission assistants, right? If you want to submit 100 articles to at least 10 article engines, that may cost you another $300-$500.

The question is how much does that bring you? Investing $1k is not a small sum, right? Well, how much traffic will it build? How fast can you opt-in your visitors? That’s the real question. After you’ve got subscribers, shouldn’t you think of the offers to bring to them? That means you really need an autoresponder system to handle that. You’ll also need a way to write your autoresponder sequence!

Wow, some more work? Well, the truth is you need to manage your business model. If the business model is not properly formed up, you will not be able to have any clarity on the business approach in the first place. Lack of clarity will cost you more money, and therefore you need to systemize your process, email writing and so on.

I hope this article will give you a starting point at least. Start drafting a basic business model surrounding article traffic, and use outsource talent to move toward your desired goals in internet marketing.

The Team That Made It To Malaysia And Back…
(clockwise from bottom left, Jacklyn, Aloysius, Me, Ming Chern, Queenie)

I had the good fortune of being able to be with over 120 Malaysians when I was in KL this weekend. We had a solid 5 hour training through lunch, and there wasn’t even enough space for my video crew, and we still have about 80 people on the waiting list. It comes, therefore, with great regret that I have no pictures! No photographs! Aaaaa….

Anyway, I’ll get a grip on myself. This looks like the new start for www.InternetMarketingMalaysia.com and the community that is going to spring up from there very, very soon!

Internet Marketing Asia – if I can call it that – is a rapidly growing industry. The fact is, dozens of speakers fly over to Singapore and other parts of Asia simply to profit from the new emerging market here in Asia. However, the truth of the matter is Asians tend to be both more skeptical and more easily hurt.

Internet Marketing Asia paints the face of a new customer – one that demands constant support, hand-holding and the need to be socially intimate with them. Without this, your efforts in marketing to Asia will fail. In fact, many speakers at recent conferences went home without a single dime in back end sales. The reason for this is simple – every individual here has been worried about the fear of backend sales not being delivered. No matter how experienced you are in your industry, Internet Marketing Asia doesn’t know YOU.

The most dangerous thing to do is to equate your success worldwide with the same success in Asia. The face of internet marketing in Asia has changed to a skeptical, inquiring and seemingly risk adverse group of people. This is the reason why the growth of internet marketing in Asia and in Singapore has been too rapid for its own good.

Three tips to succeed in Asia:

#1 – Spend focused time. Don’t run away after a one or two day event. Cultivate their interest, teach them to consume their learnings, and be willing to take the time to build business ventures locally to consolidate your position.

#2 – Promote long term support – face to face. It’s tough to deal with the skepticism already. You need to build a face-to-face relationship. After all, in Asia, we’re talking about relationships and interdependence. Culturally, people from the West have failed to make headway without penetrating the market in a suitable fashion

#3 – Join a local forum. Here’s where I blow my own horn. You need a local partner to help bring your “brand” to the next level. Join the Internet Marketing Singapore forums and build credibility and believability where I probably have the largest community of active internet marketers in Asia.