Google Website Optimizer is partnering with ideaLaunch company SplitTestLab for our Website Optimizer services. Only 13 U.S. companies are Google-certified Technology Partners, so the office was pretty happy to hear the news.

SplitTestLab is our innovative way to make your website more awesome and you more money. We simultaneously test three different versions of one of your landing pages—including headlines, copy, design, offers and incentives—to see which version gets the most conversions. SplitTestLab is 100-percent focused on one solution: three variations for any single landing page tested against the original page.

Within three weeks of meeting us, the client sees both more conversions and better Google landing page ranks thanks to the ease of Google’s Optimizer platform. Read more about our testing process and email if you’re interested in having our staff of geniuses test your landing page.

Do you know anything about staffing? That’s kind of a vague question, so let me be more specific: Do you know anything about staffing in the IT, Engineering, Accounting & Finance, International HR, Nursing, Physician, Clinical or Legal fields? We just landed a big client and will be churning out 2,250 tips in the next four weeks. That’s 337,500 words!

We can’t do this without writers, of course. So log onto your job board and apply to these projects ASAP … or just contact me at Carolyn@LifeTips.com.

Site Gurus know they don’t get paid for managing their tip site at LifeTips. Instead of money, they get an online platform where they can share their knowledge, writing style and personality with the world—clients and potential employers in particular. Gurus get thousands of unique monthly online visitors hooked on their opinion, expertise and commentary. They manage a community of readers, mediate comments and become the epicenter for an ongoing conversation. And LifeTips is there to support them with the technology and supervision to do so. 

Some of our tip sites are sponsored by clients. In this circumstance, we are able to pay the Site Guru a flat fee for a bulk amount of tips and blog posts. Not a bad deal, right? The only downside is that Gurus whose sites aren’t sponsored sometimes feel slighted. 

If you’re one of these people, keep your chin up. While your niche may not be sponsored right now, your ability to manage, promote and drive traffic to your site looks great to potential clients, who may be wooed some time down the road to sponsor your niche. Link those tips, post links back to your site on your personal blog and online forums and keep pumping out great content. Even though it may not be cash in your hand right now, it could pay off in the long run. Your Tip Site is just one more way to add credibility to your name and get your mug out to the masses.

If you’re still shopping for people on your holiday gift list, I have a great idea. Buy your friends and/or worst enemies one of our new titles, fresh off the press. At $9.99 a pop, you can buy a copy for yourself too.

101 Basketball Tips

The last time I played basketball I was 12 years old. While all I knew how to play was HORSE, today after reading Coach Ray Lokar’s book I feel ready for the pros. This book will help you polish your skills and drills and give you the tips, tools and techniques to take your game to the next level. Now if only reading a book could get me in shape.

101 Puppy-Buying Tips

Dog lover and puppy-buying professional Roseann Benson answers all your questions about choosing that puppy in the window. She brings her experience raising her Newfoundland, Cleo, to these bite-size tips any puppy person can chew on, from the Norfolk terrier neophyte to the Greyhound guru. Nice tiara, Cleo!

101 Tips on Creating a Successful PR Campaign

Have a story to tell? Get it out into the public eye with Mary White’s PR campaign tips. Her practical advice will teach you how to make any story newsworthy, how to write an effective press release and where to send it. After all, if a press release falls in a forest…

So, you wrote a 101-tip book with LifeTips and now you want to get paid. Here’s how our payment process works:

·         Once your book is on Amazon.com and LifeTips.com and available for purchase at Barnes & Noble and Borders, every time someone orders your book you make $2 on the $9.99 retail sale. Royalty checks are sent out quarterly.

·         When authors order books through their editor, they get a $3 discount per book. When you sell these books for their $9.99 retail value, you make your $3 per-book profit.

·         If you are an aggressive marketer—our favorite kind of author—and you get a group or corporation to order a large quantity of books, you have the opportunity to earn even more money per book. The specific amount would depend on the size of the order. Ask your editor if this occasion arises.

If you haven’t published a book with LifeTips yet, here’s some advice. Gurus should not only offer us a detailed outline of their book, they should also give us a detailed outline of their book marketing plan. LifeTips does not have a marketing or PR department for the book division, thus we ask our authors to take the initiative and submit their book to local retailers and literary competitions, as well as coordinate author readings and book signings at local libraries and cafes. We have had several extremely successful books, and the common thread was the authors’ knack to get their book out in the public eye.

Dear Clients,

We love you. We love serving you, writing your tips and optimizing your web pages, and helping your website get better Google listings. Like any healthy relationship, the love must be mutual. You show us your love by reviewing your tips and articles promptly, giving us constructive feedback, and answering our emails and phone calls when we contact you.

But some of you—and you know who you are—are avoiding us. Your tips have been pending approval for weeks and even months, and you don’t return our phone calls or emails. Do you not love us anymore? Are you breaking up with us?

Don’t do it, please. It will never work. We will stalk you. We will relentlessly come find you, wherever you are, until you review your tips and every single last one is approved. Then we will deliver your tip center to you and solicit more business from you so that our relationship can continue forever. Call it a habit, call it an addiction, call us “lonely,” we need your eternal love to go on living and we will not rest until we have it.

Yours truly,

Carolyn

Carolina was in Baja California Sur last week. That’s the falling-off-into-the-ocean Mexican side of California for the geographically challenged. Home of the cactus, blue marlin and the Damiana margarita. (If you’ve never had this herb-based aphrodisiac liqueur before, just ask Raphael’s roommates about it.) Lots of sand too. If you ever visit the southern region, don’t skimp on the SUV upgrade—the unpaved roads are so sandy they made driving our subcompact Chevy feel like treading quicksand. And Jamison was so kind to make me acutely aware that the Sea of Cortez is also the home of the man-eating Humboldt squid. But I like calamari so I wasn’t afraid to go into the water. The snorkeling was killer: I saw a brown white-spotted manta ray, a moray eel, yellow fin tuna, dorado (a.k.a mahi mahi, and mostly on my dinner plate), parrot fish, angel fish, rooster fish, puffer fish (alive and dead and dried up on the beach), lots of plain-old-fish and on the sand I saw vultures eating a dead seal. From my room I was able to watch a group of three osprey fish for dinner, communicating to each other in high shrills. It was a treat for me to witness such a thriving habitat up close.

I’d like to thank my amazing production team for taking over while I was away and making sure that nothing really, really seriously bad happened in my absence. (We’ll put that whole “Oops I wasn’t supposed to post that really sensitive document on the Internet” fiasco behind us.) What’s really important is that we have a hard-working group of people who step up to challenges and solve problems as a team.

If you know me, you know I wasn’t tree-huggin’ the whole time on my vacation. With the giddy bounce in my step of a foreigner with a better exchange rate in her pocket, I hit up every Mexican tienda (or “gift store” in Gringo) from La Paz to Cabo (in this sparse area that gets the count up to about 3). Check out my loot.

Thanks to all the current and prospective Site Gurus who called in to yesterday’s first call since the Site Guru Program was officially launched earlier this month. The energy was high on both ends of the receiver as Byron coached Gurus about the do’s and don’ts of their new responsibility.

If you weren’t able to make the call—naughty!—here’s a summary of what you missed:

·         Why Guru Program? You asked for it, now we’re giving you your own site accompanied by your photo, your tips, and your resume. This truly is YOUR space to use as a platform of discussion on your topic. It will establish you as an authority and expert in your field. Will it make you rich? No. But it will improve your freelance writing prospects with our clients and the world at large.

·         Application Process

o    If you applied for a niche and haven’t yet received a reply, sit tight. We’ll either approve or reject new Site Guru applications in the coming weeks.

o   Those with bona fide experience in their niche and online community experience are preferred.

·         Book Publishing

o   Yes, it’s FREE.

o   We want each and every Site Guru to publish a book. But not just any book. This book will consist of 101 of your best, most polished tips from your Tip Site.

o   Book submissions laden with poor grammar and inappropriate material will not be published and will warrant niche reassignment.

·         Management

o   You must post at least 20 tips and/or blog posts a month.

o   All content MUST be original and unique, free of copyright infringement, well-researched and factual, and upheld by the latest professional standards.

o   Please moderate all comments. Edit and delete as you see fit.

·         Tip Site Traffic

o   It is your responsibility to increase the traffic of your Tip Site.

o   Reach out to other blogs and encourage people to visit your site.

o   Promote your Tip Site in your social network.

o   List your Site in a directory and use the newsletter function (coming soon).

Want all the juicy details? Listen to the recording.

Balloons. Wine. Chips, cookies and a crown. Yesterday was National Boss Day, and LifeTips employees honored our Julius Caesar with a party fit for a dictator perpetuo. But even Caesar can’t claim Byron White’s ability as a firm, fair but fun leader, as declared in the sign “Byron Is Ausome.”

We love our boss so much it’s frightening. Just watch this video of our Stevie Wonder rendition, a serenade to our Numero Uno.

While we can thank Mandy for the lyrics, I think the real winner in this video is Sean, who declared his love for Byron on one knee. Sean, way to be a team player. Consider your bonus check in the mail.

Are you frustrated that you didn’t get a byline on an article you wrote for a client? What a bummer, I know.  You want to show your hard work to your mom, post links to it on your blog, and get some credit for your hard work. But think of it this way: no byline = more work and more $$ for you.

Your byline does not appear with your tip or article because when you signed up to work for LifeTips, you agreed to our terms and conditions: “Any tips or content I submit to LifeTips, in any form, for purposes of web publishing or book publishing, shall instantly become the property of LifeTips.” The client subsequently purchases the copyright from LifeTips. One of the reasons LifeTips appeals to our big-name, deep-pocketed clients is content ownership. The more prominent clientele we attract means more work and cash for you.