Neil Patel - Mentor in online marketing

I have 8 people that wake up with me every morning focused on my business profits.

They are my mentors.

We roll out of bed together.

We eat oatmeal together.

I haven’t let them into the shower yet though. That’s just weird.

They sympathize with me. They smack me around a bit, and they help me tap into reservoirs of potential. Because of them, I've tripled my business profits and I'm rejuvenated every time I start my day. It’s crazy too because these people are the absolute best at what they do. I still can’t figure out why they care enough to hang out with me every day and teach me all they know.

Who are your mentors? Do they increase your business profits? Do they answer your questions and support you when you really need the help? I know that mine sure do.

I can count on them whenever I need them because my 8 mentors are some of the world’s best at teaching via a small business blog . They’ve grown massive empires from scratch, and yet they reside with me at all times… on my iphone.

That’s right. My 8 mentors are small business blog experts. They're masters of their craft and they inspire me to be better at mine.

Coming Up...

In this post, I am going to give you one of the best gifts I know how to give – my mentors. I’m going to introduce you to 8 of the best small business blog entrepreneurs out there. If you’re new to blogging, I am also going to teach you how to become a master student in the blogosphere.

WARNING: Reading beyond this point will in fact change your business for the good. If you do not wish to increase your business profits, culture, staff, and lifestyle then it is strongly advised that you close this window and play solitaire.

Still here?

Good.

Let’s begin.

Blogs Boost Your Business Profits

Many people shun blogs. I used to be one of them. I thought they were a waste of time; nothing more than millions of people babbling about things that didn't matter.

Then I started reading them.

You need to discover high-value blogs and suck all of the juice out of them. They’re good for you.

Laura Roeder - Mentor in social media

If we’re going to increase your business profits and streamline your costs, you need to surround yourself with the best of the best. Fortunately for you, those kinds of people are waiting to help out.

We've coached over 500 business owners around the world, and I’m honored that you’re here with me today. Since you are here reading this, I hope it’s alright if I assume that same relationship with you for just a moment.

As your finance coach, let me ask you this… How strong is your core team that you surround yourself with? Do you have gaps? Of course you do. If you said no, you need to get honest with yourself.

If you're going to increase your business profits, you need the world’s best in marketing, finance, sales, operations, and so on standing by you.

By choosing the best possible mentors available, you’re going to get further faster. Business profits will increase faster than you could possible imagine. Why would you seek advice from anyone less qualified?

Since the best of the best only have some much time in a day, they have chosen to improve their communities through blogging. One last question before we apply this stuff…

Let’s pretend you want to drive traffic to your website, and you don’t know how. Business profits are down and you need a mentor. Someone that’s been there and has come back successful. Would you rather have Uncle Nick tinker on the site and make things worse, or would you rather learn directly from Neil Patel – One of the world’s foremost experts on getting high quality traffic and converting them into loyal customers? You pick.

Who is more likely to boost your business profits?

OR

How to Become a “Bad-A” Blog Reader in 10 Minutes or Less

If you’ve never gotten into the blog scene, here’s how it works. Each blog will be posting articles on a regular basis if they’re any good. I’ll be giving you a list of my favorites in just a moment.

Find 5 to10 blogs that are specific to your needs as a business owner. Some blogs like the one your're reading right now at Ignite Spot, deal with increasing business profits. Other blogs focus on marketing or motivation. Once you find blogs that you want to read, you need a way to get organized. If you sat down each morning, logged in to each site and tried to read all of the new content - you would go crazy. You would also be late for work. It would take forever to get through everything.

You need a tool that brings them all together into one spot.

There are two common tools for getting organized:

1. Subscribe to your mentors blog by email. Each blog will have a box, usually in the upper right hand corner, that will ask you to subscribe. Each time your mentor creates a new article, you will get an email. When you get those emails, treasure them and make time to read them.
2. Subscribe by RSS: This approach can be really convenient, but you may miss some content. In order to get information via RSS, you need a reader. My favorite RSS reader is feedly.

In feedly, you can look each of your mentor’s blogs, subscribe to them, and then categorize the blog into common tags. I can attribute a lot of our business profits to this little piece of software. It keeps me connected with my mentors and that is a great thing.

I get all of my blog content through feedly, and I subscribe to my favorite blogs by e-mail so that I don’t miss any updates. Again, these people are my mentors and I need to soak up everything they have to say.

How to Chat with Your Mentors

Here's a tip to increase business profits. Every time one of your mentors creates an article, there’s a section at the bottom of the page for you to leave comments. This is a great opportunity to ask them questions related to the article.

Some of these people charge thousands of dollars and hour for what they do, and yet you can ask them questions for free right on their blog. Awesome.

Just to drive the point home, here is a screen shot from QuickSprout. You’ll notice that someone named Chirag Dodiya left a comment and Neil Patel responded. What really impressed me in this shot was the time stamps. Chirag made the comment at 7:20 AM and by 10:39 AM, Neil responded.

You’re not going to get a response to every comment you make, and you certainly won’t get responses this quickly all of the time, but how great is it to be connected with experts?

If you have a question that may up your business profits, why not ask?

Action Item: Let’s give this a shot. Since you’re reading this blog post right now – scroll to the bottom and leave a comment. Ask me a question, and I will respond. Try it.

Remember I write about how to increase business profits. If you ask me about something random like cats, I won't respond. I've never owned one in my life.

Here are my 8 Mentors and Their Blogs

Online Marketing

QuickSprout

If you can’t tell by now, Quick Sprout is my favorite blog. I read it religiously. In my opinion, Neil Patel creates the best content available for learning how to drive traffic to your site, convert them into great customers, and build a better business overall. If you want to increase your business profits, subscribe to this blog and read every piece of content that you get.

Conversion Rate Experts

These guys are the masters of getting people to buy on a website. If you can get people to your site, but you can’t get them to take the actions you want, then you need to read this blog. Period.

Hubspot

Hubspot is the content marketing gorilla. These guys spin out tons of great e-books, courses, and everything in-between. They are at the forefront of the new marketing phenomenon, which is pull marketing instead of push marketing. If you have no idea what the difference is, this blog is for you. All I can say is that you should be doing a lot of pull marketing or else you’re going to get left in the dust.

LKR Social Media

Laura Roeder has become one of the internet's social media gurus. If you truly want to figure this stuff out, Laura is your coach.

Writing & Blogging Tips

Copyblogger

I started off blogging because I wanted more traffic to visit Ignite Spot. Now I do it because I love sharing what I've learned with our clients and friends across the web. It’s so rewarding. With that being said, I have a long way to go when it comes to being a better writer. Copyblogger has helped me learn how to write. Their articles are a great resource for creating something that may get read one day.

I know guys. I know. I’m working on the adjectives!

Entrepreneurship

Mixergy

This blog is in a class unto itself. Andrew Warner is the mentor on this, and guess what he does… He video interviews the worlds best entrepreneurs. Why in the heck are you not watching every one of these?!

Michael Hyatt

Michael talks about several things on his blog. He covers personal development, leadership, productivity, etc. It’s a great blog for any small business owner needing a shot in the arm of wake-up juice.

Sparring Mind

Gregory Ciotti has put together a pretty sweet blog here. It’s all about understanding why people do the things they do. This mentor will teach you the psychology within your business.

Shameless plug time... This is outside of the 8 people listed above

Ignite Spot

We coach and write about business profits. Our entire focus is on helping you build a great business that can pay you $250k or more each year. If you want to increase your business profits, we do our best to give you the tools and tips necessary to making that happen.

Alright everyone. We’re wrapping up here. I hope you take a few minutes today to apply what we’ve talked about. Fill your world with the right people and you will go further faster.

Good luck. May your business profits rise to unimaginable heights.