Video: How to Fix Wordpress Fatal Error Problem

Andi Putra — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:07:02 +0000

I tried to install a plugin yesterday and encounter a huge problem, which caused fatal error messages appeared in my Wordpress administrator page. It’s scary. But fortunately, I was able to fix it. This video is created to help those who might be experiencing the same problem and also to remind myself how to fix it (if it ever happened again ^-^).

Hope this helps and feel free to re-tweet this.

How to Beat the Top Blogs: A Contemplation

Andi Putra — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:14:00 +0000

If you watched the Academy Awards yesterday , you’ll agree with me in saying that it’s a shocker. When you thought Avatar, the best selling movie of all time, will win the most prestigious Best Picture award, it lost. I was really disappointed and upset with the result, mostly because I’ve put a huge bet on Avatar (which I’ll never do again), and secondly, because Avatar loses to a movie with a fraction of its budget, Hurt Locker.

So, in this post, I’ll analyse some of the things that Hurt Locker did right to win the Oscar and how you can apply them to your blogging.

1. Designed For Critics

Hurt Locker knows how to position itself in the competitive film market. The director and script writer focused their efforts on the getting the best acting (actor’s performance), story progression, and cinematography, elements of a movie that the critics love. And this proven formula seemed to work once again as Hurt Locker wins the Oscar.

So, study your market. You’ve to know who reads your blog (or who you want to read your blog) and what they love, so that you can create contents that are tailored for them. If your audience can relate to your writing, they’ll come back again and again to your blog, despite there are other bigger blogs out there.

2. New Perspective

How many movies have been made about the war in Iraq? Yeah, I can already recall five from the top of my head and I’m sure there’re a whole lot more. And Hurt Locker, is unfortunately one of them. But, unlike other war in Iraq movies that focused on the actions and shootings, Hurt Locker focused on building characters and the relationship between each one of them. It’s an interesting take on such an overused setting.

Sure, blogging and SEO (search engine optimization) have been dissected from almost every imaginable ways. But, some bloggers can still find sub niches within these two huge topics. You can, for example, write about blog designs, pay per click marketing, or social media. Or, rather than doing written posts (like almost every other blogs out there), you might want to publish video or audio posts. People always wants something fresh. So, if you can give it to them, you win.

3. Proud to be Small

Hurt Locker isn’t shy to be a low budget movie. In fact, one of the producers are so proud of it that he sent a letter to the Academy Awards juries, asking them to let Hurt Locker wins because of its miniscule budget.

So, never be ashamed of the size of your blog (ehem…that sure sounds awkward). There are advantages of being a small blog. For instance, you can test new ideas quickly and easily on your blog without the fear of disappointing your loyal readers.

That’s all folks. Remember to always design your contents for your target audience, try to write from new perspective, and always be proud of your blog.

Do You Want to be a Better Person?

Andi Putra — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 14:07:00 +0000

According to a Cambridge University study, watching uplifting clip from the Oprah Winfrey Show can make you a better person. As part of the study, 30 people watched an uplifting clip from the show and the other 30 people watched part of a nature documentary film.

Afterwards, they were paid to write an essay on what they watched and asked if they would help with another study, this time without being paid. About 70 percent of the Oprah watchers agreed to the further study compared to only 40 percent of the doco viewers.

Another Experiment

In his book, The Black Swan, Nassim Nicholas Taleb told us about one interesting experiment involving numbers. The participants of the experiment were asked to state their social security numbers before specifying any random numbers, from one to infinity. And guess what, all of the participants stated numbers that resemble their social security numbers.

The Oprah’s experiment coupled with the case study from The Black Swan convinced me that we’re so easily manipulated by our surroundings, whether we’re aware of it or not. Of course, this can be both negative and positive. On one hand, we might now feel very susceptible to product advertising and marketing in general.

The Positive

But, on the other hand, we can use this knowledge to motivate ourselves and thus grow our online business, possibly by watching motivational videos and listening to motivational speeches. Because, if the above experiments are true, we’ll inevitably be motivated to take necessary actions to accomplish our goals.

So, I guess it’s time to delete the songs in your iPod and substitute them with Anthony Robbins’ motivational audios. Yeah, and watch Oprah.

No related posts.

The #1 Trap when Making Money Online

Andi Putra — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:02:35 +0000

Guess. Guess. It’s not hidden or mysterious. Believe it or not, the ultimate trap of making money online that most of us have fallen into, at one time or another, is staring right at us. And yet, we can’t seem to notice it. So, what is it?

It’s information.

Information is a double-edged sword. We can’t dismiss it, as we need to know how to do something before we can actually do it. For example, we need to understand the concept of search engine optimization before we can optimize our site.

The Pleasurable Trap

And yet, when we are presented with too much information, we somehow lose the will to act. We convinced ourselves that by having the knowledge, we are superior. And to be even better, we need more knowledge and so we try to find more information. We read the blogging tutorials, watch the list building videos, buy the product launch training course, and so on.

We are trapped in, what I like to call, the destructive information cycle (D.I.C).

Contrary to the norm, it is pleasurable to be in this trap. We don’t take any actions or do any work, and yet we feel better about ourselves.

Dealing with D.I.C

But, if you are really serious about making money online, you’ll better get out of this destructive information cycle. And get out fast. As the longer you stay, the harder it is to succeed.

The first step to get out of the D.I.C is to realize that you are in one. Just like drug or alcohol addicts admitting their addiction, we first need to admit that we’re addicted to information.

Then, it’s time to take some radical actions.

First, unsubscribe to all the mailing lists you’ve joined before and only subscribe to those that provide real values (not sales pitches) to you.

Second, stop buying info products and learn from the ones you already have.

Third, limit your blog and forum reading time to an hour or two a day.

Fourth, take the first step. Be it writing your first blog post, creating your first video tutorial, or setting up your email auto-responder.

By doing the steps above, you should have more time and a less cluttered mind to start working toward your goals, be it making money online from blogging, affiliate marketing, or any other methods.

If you found these tips useful, you should probably subscribe to my blog via rss or email. Just so you’ll get easy updates on new articles about persuasion, influence and marketing. Cheers.

Frank Kern: How To Change Your Life & Business Forever

Andi Putra — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 04:33:11 +0000

I received an email from Frank Kern yesterday. At first, I thought…“Huh, another sales pitch…?” But then, because the email was from Frank and all, I opened it. And I’m glad I did.

The email contained a link to the recorded video presentation by Frank Kern called Core Influence, created in early 2008. In it, Frank talked about how to achieve success by knowing what you really want and who you really are, and knowing what your market really want and who they really are. It’s a fantastic video that goes far beyond the superficial making money online talks that the gurus are selling, and into the realms of subsconcious bond with your true self and customers.

It’s a great video and I can’t recommend it more. Check it out here, Frank Kern’s Core Influence. Btw, you need to sign-up to watch it.

What Can Software Companies Teach You About Success?

Andi Putra — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 14:09:00 +0000

“Wait, blog’s not ready yet, I need to add this fancy plug-in to it. Another month, please.”

“Can’t start my list-building, I need to redesign my squeeze page and add follow-up emails to my auto responder. Another month, please.”

We are all too familiar when this happens. We tell ourselves that we are making things perfect and that it’s gonna be the best when it’s done. But deep inside, we know that’s not true. What we are doing is just…

Avoiding the possibility of Failure.

We’ve been brainwashed with the ‘boy wonder’ success stories, perpetrated by the media . You know, the typical tale of how a man/woman from a small town and without any [insert the field they excel at] background is able to be a champion in their chosen field. The media had used this storyline for Tiger Woods (when he won his first major championship at the age of 21), Steven Spielberg (when he made his first blockbuster movie), and so many other successful people that it’s hard to list them all.

And, we want to be this ‘boy wonder’.

The problem is, by trying to be them (perfect), we are not avoiding the possibility of failure. On the other hand, we are sabotaging ourselves from the possibility of success. Who ever guess Google will be this profitable by providing ‘free’ search engine service for the masses? Who knows Facebook will get this big when there are tons of other social networking sites competing for the same market? NOBODY.

Learning From The Giants

Both Google and Facebook founders believe in their respective products, long before it was launched. So, they do what they do and succeed. But, does that mean it could have gone the other way and fail? Of course. But, that doesn’t stop them from trying.

One thing that I find very useful to overcome the fear of failure is to think like software companies. Remember how long Gmail is in the beta phase? Google, one of the largest online company in the world, released an imperfect(beta) product before releasing its full version a year later.

Microsoft, one of the largest software company in the world, also did this by releasing the beta version of Windows 7 before launching the full version a few months later. The success of Gmail and Windows 7 is the result of continuous testing and tweaking at the beta phase of each products.

Putting It Into Practice

To put this concept into a more practical sense, every time I get into the pattern of negative what-ifs, I always answered them with “So what?”. “What if this fail?”, “What if people don’t like it?”, “What if the conversion rate of this page is not high?”. “So what? So what? and So what?” I can tweak it later. I can reset the project. And I can modify it to fit my readers’ expectation.

So, what can software companies teach you about success? Start today. Start blogging today. Start driving people to your squeeze page today. Then, if you are not satisfied with the outcome, tweak and modify them. Never be afraid of failure because you’ll always get the chance to fix it.

No related posts.

Is There Money in Making Your Own Web Show?

Andi Putra — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:03:00 +0000

I recently discovered this video sharing site called Blip.tv. It’s not a new site (been online since 2005) and, at first, I thought it’s just another Youtube clone, with a slight twist to its concept. How? For one, Blip.tv doesn’t accept a one-off video. If you want to post a video to the site, make sure it’s a series of videos that can be released on a regular basis.

Interesting. But not as much as how it’s taking the video sharing and advertising concept to the next level.

When you register as a new blip.tv member, you can tick the ‘Enable Advertising On My Show’ box. This will allow blip.tv to put advertising on your show and thus let you get the 50/50 advertising revenues share that they’re offering. The ad revenue itself is calculated based on the number of views on your videos.

And it doesn’t stop there, blip.tv will also help distribute your videos to other video and social networking sites, like Youtube, AOL video, MSN video, Facebook, MySpace, iTunes and even TiVo. They will then add up the number of audience from blip.tv and all of the other sites into what they called as TPA (Total Potential Audience). So, rather than relying on one venue, such as Youtube, to build your audience, the video creator will be able to utilize multiple venues to get more views and thus obtaining higher ad revenues.

Now, if their claim that a show with 100,000 views a month can pay off someone’s rent is true. And, that someone’s rent is $600/month. That means, if you’re one of the Youtube’s reasonably famous personality, you’ll be able to earn approximately $3,000/month (500,000 views/month). And if you’re one of the top dogs, you’ll be able to earn approximately $12,000/month (500,000 views/weekly show). And, we haven’t even included the number of viewers from other sites and blip .tv itself.

So, as you can see, doing your own online show can be extremely profitable. No, you won’t be able to earn that 6 figure income. But, if you can do what you love and earn a reasonable income from it…why not do it?

Getting Back! with Some Changes

Andi Putra — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 11:04:08 +0000

Almost 4 months. That’s how long I’ve stopped blogging. But, I’m back!

A lot of things happen these past couple of months. Some are good and some…not so good. The good ones include spending the holiday with my parents and sisters in Europe, having some crazy fun time with my college friends, and watching Avatar (not disappointed with the final product, despite the ridiculous pre-launch hype).

But, as if to balance out these good experiences, I’ve also gone through this real bad one. My laptop’s broken in the holiday. And since I use a password database software to remember my passwords, losing access to my laptop and its hard drive means I don’t have access to my passwords. My blogs’ passwords, my emails’ passwords, everything. And that’s why I can’t update my blog until I’m back to Australia two weeks ago.

I’m not a whiner and usually able to look for the positives in bad experiences. So, instead of complaining, I used the 4 months time to reflect on this blog. What’s lacking? What needs to change? How to get more traffic and subscribers in this new year? And a whole lot of other questions. Based on my answers to those questions, I’ve decided to update this blog. These are some changes that’s made and will be made to the blog.

Firstly, as you can see, I change the blog’s theme as I find the old one too plain and sterile.

Secondly, I’ll change my typical list-type posts to a shorter and more opinionated ones.

Thirdly, I’ll add a couple of mini weekly video tutorials starting next week, with topics ranging from traffic generation, social media marketing, to list building.

Finally, I’ll do a weekly video podcast starting next week. Be sure to drop in your questions, if you have any, using the contact form.

So, stay tune for more electrifying contents to come.

I Don’t Need to Build a List?

Video: A Bit Old, But Awesome Google SuperBowl Ad

Andi Putra — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 12:05:09 +0000

This ad is a bit old (in internet terms…), but it’s still one of the best commercials I’ve seen on TV in recent years. Very subtle, yet creative use of video marketing. Notice there’s no actor involved, no big budget motion graphic designs, or technical claims. But, it’s enough to make me a Google fanboy. What do you guys think?

Why You Can’t Make Money Online?

Andi Putra — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 01:07:46 +0000

We are all striving to make money online. But, whether you like it or not, only a few of us will succeed in doing so. And that’s not because that one guy is smarter than the rest of the pack. Or that he obtained the secret knowledge to internet wealth (I wonder if this mythical treasure actually exists…). What he have is patience, determination, and the correct understanding of what it takes to make money online.

Let Me Tell You A Story

I have a friend who has been blogging for over 2 years now. He had a fantastic amount of traffic coming to his blog and he also had a relatively good amount of RSS and email subscribers for it. The problem is, after 2 years in business, he haven’t managed to make a huge amount of money online. He had tried Adsense, promoting affiliate products, and even some sponsored links, but he can’t make more than a couple hundreds of dollars a month. So, he contacted me and asked me what’s wrong with his site and how he can fix it. But, there’s nothing wrong with his site. The problem lies with him.

It’s Not About the Traffic

One thing I noticed about him, whenever we talked about internet marketing stuff, is how he always boasts about how much traffic he can get using various methods and strategies that he learned from gurus or by himself. He spent hours everyday, trying to figure out what new traffic method he can use, rather than using the old, but reliable ones. And, there lies the problem.

Don’t get me wrong. Driving traffic to your site is important. But, it shouldn’t be the part that consume most of your time when making money online. Why? Because, traffic doesn’t necessarily makes you any money. Facebook is undeniably one of the largest site online right now, with hundred millions of users registered. Surely they have the traffic to make crazy amount of money, right? Wrong. They’re losing more money than they make as of 2008. Traffic eats up your bandwidth, slow down your site, and fill up your server. It costs you money, not making you more.

It’s Not About the List

Another problem that he had is that he focus on building his list without having any real purpose for it, other than promoting some affiliate products. Having a list is great. But, as I say again and again, the money is not in the list, it’s in the relationship you’ve built with the people in your list. So, if you have a list, but you never emailed them anything but affiliate product promotions, you only have yourself to blame for the bad sales.

Having a giant list is also useless if the people inside your list is not your target customers. That’s why you’ll never make a cent from a list of some 100,000 people from Africa or China. A huge list doesn’t mean anything if your prospects doesn’t buy from you. In order for them to do so, you need to spend as much effort (as your traffic and list building effort) on this last, and often ignored, part of making money online.

Everything Comes Down to…

Conversion and authority.

Conversion means transforming your prospects into buyers. You can apply this to your subscribers by converting your free list, meaning the people in the list haven’t bought anything from you yet, to a buyers list (list full of buyers), which he definitely hadn’t done. Let them make small purchases, like buying a $3 to $7 eBook. After they’re comfortable in making small commitments with you, you can start offering them higher prices affiliate products.

Authority is a result of your popularity and positioning in a niche or market. You can positioned yourself to be the traffic guru, the super affiliate marketer, or the authoritative blogger. It doesn’t matter what you choose, as long as you emphasize it in whatever you’re involved in. Be it social media space, your videos or podcasts, or even in your blog posts. By having authority, you’ll have an easier time to sell your products because the people in your niche have known and accepted that you’re the expert in your field.

You need to understand that your final goal in this industry is to make money online. I say this because I saw many people seem to be missing the point. My friend is proud of how much traffic he can get. Or how many people is in his mailing list. But, it really doesn’t matter how much traffic you have or how many people are in your list. You’re here to make money, huge amount of money if possible. And until you do, you shouldn’t stop trying.

Feel free to leave comments below or tweet it if you like it.