information marketing

Suzanne Morrison asked:




Do you ever have the feeling of information overload? Do you sometimes feel overwhelmed at that overstuffed inbox, or feel like you will never know enough to succeed in your internet marketing or home business? Every day you are bombarded with new information, emails to read and answer, new reports and e-books to download, courses to purchase, training to work through, information for affiliate programs you have joined, forum posts to read or the next “guru” telling you that you have to buy their great new product.

If this is a problem for you, you are not the only one! It is very common for people to feel overwhelmed when they try to start their own internet business or get involved in internet marketing to make some extra money online. I felt the same way when I started out over three years ago. The good news is that this feeling will lessen over time. Now and then I still feel that old familiar feeling of information overload sinking in, but it certainly not as severe as it was when I first started out.

Here are a few tips to help you get on your way to feeling like a normal person again…

(1) Accept that you can!will never know everything. You don’t need to know everything about internet marketing and it is unlikely that you ever will. Your knowledge and skills will increase over time naturally, but don’t beat yourself up about your lack of knowledge. Take a deep breath and don’t allow yourself to feel overwhelmed or in a panic about this.

(2) Keep your Inbox Organised – this is very important. In the information age we are bombarded by emails. Some emails are for us to read only and others are from people who often expect an immediate reply. The best thing to do here is to create folders in your email program for different types of emails. For example I have folders for receipts, invoices, download links, affiliate program communications, login information etc. When you are reading your email you can file emails into folders instead of feeling the need to read them instantly. For example you may have just joined an affiliate program and they are sending you information by email. You may find this information useful in the future, but you are not ready for all these tips at the moment. If this is the case just file these emails in a folder and study them at a point in the future when you are ready.

(3) Keep a To-Do list – it is always helpful to put together some sort of plan or “to-do” list. I have a master list with everything that I want to do in the long term and I also have a list of things that I would like to do in the near future, for example, in the next week or fortnight. If I think of something new, which is not urgent I add it to my master list rather than my short term list. This helps to prevent me from becoming distracted and keeps me focused on the things that are immediately important.

(4) Learn to use the Unsubscribe link – this may sound very obvious, but how many newsletters are you subscribed to? Are you getting value from them? Do you have enough time to read them? If the answer to either of these two questions is no, then be decisive and click on that unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email!

(5) Think about Outsourcing – it’s not possible to be an expert in everything. For example, I am good at building and updating websites, but I am useless at creating graphics and using photo or graphic editing software. Rather than spend hours trying to learn these skills I pay someone to create graphics for my site. You can outsource people to write articles for you, design websites, update your website, write your sales copy and more. Concentrate on the areas that you are good at (or that you enjoy and want to be good at) and this will help alleviate the feeling of information overload.

The next time you are feeling overwhelmed, take a deep breath, realise that you are not alone in feeling like this and read these 5 tips to help you get back on track.

Robert