I think it is “timely” that we talk about how to create profitable business ideas for your online business.

Why is it timely? Here’s why…

On Wednesday, I released our brand new List Builder Script, free for all leadsleap members. Shortly after the release, I received many emails from members asking what are the business ideas that can be used with the script.

Now, technically speaking, the script can be used for any niche and any business idea. The only problem is some business ideas may be more profitable than the others.

So in today’s blog, I’ll show you how to create profitable business ideas.

First, you have to decide which niche market to focus on and whether the niche is profitable.

If I were to start another online business tomorrow, I will have to make sure that……

1) The market has an ongoing supply of new products that I can promote.

2) People’s interest in that niche do not change too quickly. For example, I will not use the List Builder Script to build a business around “spyware removal” because once I provide them with the solution, they are not likely to want to hear from me again.

3) People in the niche are always craving for more information.

4) There are many affiliates in the niche that I can contact and JV with.

5) There are established websites where I can find lots of people interested in the niche. This is to ensure that I can easily find targeted traffic for my new business, through advertising or striking deals with the webmasters.

Examples of good niches are internet marketing, stock trading, forex trading, body building, holistic health and personal improvement.

If I found a niche that I see a potential in, I will ask myself 2 questions.

1) Can I find/create a useful product to giveaway?
2) Can I find/create a high value product to sell?

1) Can I find/create a useful product to giveaway?

In some niches, you can find some PLR products that you can give away. This is by far the fastest way to kick start your online business.

Another way is to create your own product, which may not be difficult at all.

The trick is to create something that is useful to the people in the niche.

Here is one idea that I just think off my head.

For example, You can create an ebook called “Online Scam Report - A complete list of scam (or near scam) programs you should avoid before you become the next victim”. Just go to Google.com and search for “scam”. You will be able to find websites discussing about different scam programs. Your job is to compile those programs into a book or if you are lazy, get a freelancer to do it.

2) Can I find/create a high value product to sell?

This is an important part in making sure that your business idea is profitable.

A profitable business idea should be able to help you generate immediate profit so as to fund your future expansion and cover your advertising costs.

This can easily be done with the One-Time-Offer feature in the free leadsleap List Builder Script and a powerful strategy that I’m going to share with you now.

The idea is to create a high value product worth thousands of dollars, write a sales letter that looks as if you are going to sell it for $197, and offer it for $9. This idea has never failed to work!

If you are in the internet marketing niche, the easiest way is to compile a huge package of PLR and MRR products that worth thousands of dollars.

Alternatively, you can create a high value product on your own.

For example, I’ve seen people giving away 1 website template and offer 10 website templates for $5 as a one time offer. This is a good and profitable business idea because website templates have high perceived values. At a great offer of $5, you bet a lot of people will bite.

Creating profitable business ideas is not rocket science. Once you can identify a profitable niche, all you have to do is to think of something useful to giveaway for list building purpose and something of high value to sell it cheap for immediate profit. Together with other backend sales, it is almost guaranteed that you’ll have a profitable business in both the short run and long run.

Many people ask me what are the steps in creating an online business. The answer is amazingly simple. But today, I’m going to make it even simpler for you.

There are only 3 steps in creating an online business.

Step 1: Select an online business model
Step 2: Create a website that executes the business model
Step 3: Promote the hell out of it!

Step 1: Select an online business model

There is one powerful online business model that I particularly prefer.

This business model was popularised by Mike Filsaime, who named this model as Butterfly Marketing.

Here is how the model works:

- You giveaway something that people want, in exchange for their email addresses.

- When these people opt-in to your list, you present them with a one-time-offer, usually a high value product at rock-bottom price. The conversion rate for a one-time-offer is usually 10%.

- You run your own affiliate program and encourage your subscribers to refer more people to your site.

- You can follow up with your list, recommend more products to them and make more sales in the future.

I like this business model because of 3 reasons:

1) You are building a list.
2) You make instant cash!
3) It’s a viral model, where your subscribers become your affiliates, who in turn refer more people to you.

So now you have it, a powerful business model that you can use to create an online business.

Let’s move on to step 2……

Step 2: Create a website that executes the business model

So, how do you create a website that can do everything that I mention above?

In short, you need a script.

Please don’t ask me what is a script. All you need to know is if you install a script to a server, you can have a website that can do all kinds of stunts that the script wants it to do. For example, if you can find an Ebay script and install it, you’ll get a website similar to Ebay. Get the idea?

So where can you find such a script?

You can either buy a ready-made one or get a freelancer to write one for you. A simple script will cost you about a hundred dollars. A multifunctional one can cost you a thousand dollars.

And here comes the good news……

I’ve created one for you, for free!

The script I’ve prepared for you comes with the following features
- everything discussed in Step 1
- a banner rotation system
- an exit popup system
- a complete autoresponder and list management system

We’re still working hard to wrap up everything and should be ready to deliver to you next week. But today, I would like to take this opportunity to give you a preview.

Take a look at the demo site here > <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com/listbuilderscript/” target=”_blank”>User Demo

Take a peep into the demo Admin back office here > <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com/listbuilderscript/admin/” target=”_blank”> Admin Demo

Like it? It will be yours soon if you are a leadsleap member. (If you are not a leadsleap member yet, it’s not too late to <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com//”>join us.)

Ok, now that you know how to create a website that executes the business model, let’s move on to Step 3.

Step 3: Promote the hell out of it!

Well, just promote the hell out of it using all the traffic generation methods you have read, heard and seen. There is no short cut to this step.

There you have it - the 3 simple steps in creating an online business. I hope next time, you are the one who answer this question “What are the steps in creating an online business?”.

Many people ask me what are the steps in creating an online business. The answer is amazingly simple. But today, I’m going to make it even simpler for you.

There are only 3 steps in creating an online business.

Step 1: Select an online business model
Step 2: Create a website that executes the business model
Step 3: Promote the hell out of it!

Step 1: Select an online business model

There is one powerful online business model that I particularly prefer.

This business model was popularised by Mike Filsaime, who named this model as Butterfly Marketing.

Here is how the model works:

- You giveaway something that people want, in exchange for their email addresses.

- When these people opt-in to your list, you present them with a one-time-offer, usually a high value product at rock-bottom price. The conversion rate for a one-time-offer is usually 10%.

- You run your own affiliate program and encourage your subscribers to refer more people to your site.

- You can follow up with your list, recommend more products to them and make more sales in the future.

I like this business model because of 3 reasons:

1) You are building a list.
2) You make instant cash!
3) It’s a viral model, where your subscribers become your affiliates, who in turn refer more people to you.

So now you have it, a powerful business model that you can use to create an online business.

Let’s move on to step 2……

Step 2: Create a website that executes the business model

So, how do you create a website that can do everything that I mention above?

In short, you need a script.

Please don’t ask me what is a script. All you need to know is if you install a script to a server, you can have a website that can do all kinds of stunts that the script wants it to do. For example, if you can find an Ebay script and install it, you’ll get a website similar to Ebay. Get the idea?

So where can you find such a script?

You can either buy a ready-made one or get a freelancer to write one for you. A simple script will cost you about a hundred dollars. A multifunctional one can cost you a thousand dollars.

And here comes the good news……

I’ve created one for you, for free!

The script I’ve prepared for you comes with the following features
- everything discussed in Step 1
- a banner rotation system
- an exit popup system
- a complete autoresponder and list management system

We’re still working hard to wrap up everything and should be ready to deliver to you next week. But today, I would like to take this opportunity to give you a preview.

Take a look at the demo site here > <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com/listbuilderscript/” target=”_blank”>User Demo

Take a peep into the demo Admin back office here > <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com/listbuilderscript/admin/” target=”_blank”> Admin Demo

Like it? It will be yours soon if you are a leadsleap member. (If you are not a leadsleap member yet, it’s not too late to <a href=”http://www.leadsleap.com//”>join us.)

Ok, now that you know how to create a website that executes the business model, let’s move on to Step 3.

Step 3: Promote the hell out of it!

Well, just promote the hell out of it using all the traffic generation methods you have read, heard and seen. There is no short cut to this step.

There you have it - the 3 simple steps in creating an online business. I hope next time, you are the one who answer this question “What are the steps in creating an online business?”.

Nowadays, it is getting harder to get high response rate to online advertising. I am not scaring you but merely stating the fact, from experience.

In the past, a simple squeeze page consisting of a headline, some tips and an opt-in form can easily get an opt-in conversion of 10%. But now, the conversion of such a squeeze page is hardly 5%!

I am utterly surprised that some professionally designed squeeze pages are getting the response rate that I expected.

Is online advertising dead?

I don’t think so. I’m still seeing advertisements with good response rate.

After studying some of the online advertising sales letters with good response rate, I realized that the fundamentals of online advertising has not changed.

The only problem is that the days of short opt-in squeeze pages are gone. Prospects are getting immune to the idea of opting in. Nice graphic and squeeze page design can no longer impress the prospects.

Things have pretty much gone back to the basic.

What is the basic?

A simple and decent sales letter showing your photograph and using the 3 ‘F’s and 1 P strategy to promote your offer.

What are the 3 ‘F’s and 1 ‘P’?

3 ‘F’s stands for Feel, Felt, Found and 1 ‘P’ stands for Proof.

A ‘back-to-the-basic’ sales letter essentially conveys the idea that “… I understand how you FEEL…. I was in your position before and I FELT this way too…… but I finally FOUND something that works …… Here are all the PROOFs that I have….”

The idea is trust, which is the fundamental of success in online advertising.

To increase the response rate to online advertising, you ought to make your prospects feel that you empathize with them, have gone through what they went through and that you are the best person whom they can trust because you are real.

One last secret that will increase the response rate to your online advertising is…… Keep advertising!

I hope you are not thinking that I am trying to hoax you into spending more in advertising.

Have you heard of the famous saying “it takes seven contacts to make a sale”?

Let me tell you a secret. Experienced marketers keep posting the same advertisement to the same group of prospects and eventually see more and more people accepting their offers after seeing their advertisements repeatedly.

Sad to say, this secret is stopping many newbies from experiencing online advertising success. Most newbies post an ad and quit for not getting the expected result. And they never try again.

I know you don’t like the idea, but it is how things work. Repeated exposure to your advertisement will build people’s trust in you. If you want to increase the response rate to online advertising, you have to keep advertising.

The story began when one of our leadsleap members complain that someone is advertising a scam program called Bux.to in our network. The scam ‘proof’ is given in this website:

http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/03/17/surprise-the-buxto-pyramid-scheme-is-a-fraud/

Because of this, I began my own assessment of this program to find out if Bux.to is really a scam.

For those of you who have not heard of Bux.to, it is a Paid To Click (PTC) program, where you are paid $0.01 for each website you personally view and $0.01 for each website your referrals view.

There is nothing wrong with PTC programs. From business point of view, each click costs the website owner $0.02, $0.01 goes to the member viewing the ad and the other $0.01 goes to the member’s sponsor. If the website owner charges $0.05 per click, which is a good bargain to most advertisers, he will make 60% profit. Good deal.

Before I continue, I probably need to tell you that I’m not a newbie in the PTC industry. To tell you the truth, I run Asia’s largest paid-to-read-email program, with more than 130,000 members. In other words, I know what I’m talking about!

When I study Bux.to’s business model, I found 2 things that make me feel uncomfortable.

1) Low advertising fee

Bux.to charges $19.10 per 1,000 member visits. This means an advertiser only pays $0.019 for each ad click.

Remember that Bux.to pays out $0.02 for each click? This means they are losing money for each ad click they sell.

To me, it is quite obvious that this pricing plan is not sustainable.

2) Selling referrals to members

Bux.to sells referrals to its members. The price is about $1 per referral.

I believe Paypal bans Bux.to because of this. (Bux.to is now using Alertpay as their payment gateway.)

To me, it simply doesn’t make business sense to sell referrals, unless my aim is to get rich quick instead of building a long-lasting business.

The reason is obvious.

If my members can make money from the referrals they’ve bought, it simply means that I am losing a lot of potential income in the long run.

If you don’t understand what I mean, ask yourself this question, “if you know that you can make $0.01 from Member-A whenever he reads an ad, and he can potentially read 10 ads a day (or earn you $0.10 a day), will you sell Member-A away for just $1?”

If your answer is no, why do you think the website wants to sell referrals for just $1 per referral?

I can only think of two reasons: 1) to get rich quick, 2) the website owner fails his maths.

Is Bux.to Paying?

If you google for Bux.to scam or Bux.to review, you will come across many people who are paid and many people who are not paid.

The general feedback is the payment is slow. The website says that members will be paid in 60 business days, but some people have waited for than 4 months and still not being paid.

It seems that they are now having a problem paying its members on time.

From my above assessment of the program, you can see that the program doesn’t have a long-term profitable business model. It may be very successful in the short run because many people can make lots of money in a short time. But in the long run, I do believe that the website will run into financial problem.

So is Bux.to a scam? You decide. You may be the lucky one who is paid.

For me, I’m not comfortable with its business model. I don’t believe that such a model is sustainable.

If you are advertising for Bux.to, I strongly encourage you to change your ad.