The second one happened when she started her own information marketing business, which earned her the title of an ?E-zine Queen.?



Because Alexandria has cleverly turned her online venture into a cash cow, she is featured, along with other successful, self-employed entrepreneurs, in a new book, ?The Official Get Rich Guide to Information Marketing on the Internet? by Robert Skrob and Bob Regnerus. The book, out in September 2008, is the sequel to last year's ?The Official Get Rich Guide to Information Marketing.?

Before Alexandria hit the jackpot as an info-marketer, ?I tried an email newsletter to promote my services and share a marketing tip of the week,? she recalls. ?I started with 10 people, including my parents and my cats.?

As odd as it may sound, Alexandria's business took off when she let her cats out of the bag. The frisky felines were wreaking havoc in Alexandria's multi-cat household and she decided to share the antics in the newsletter. ?That was it, just a sentence or two,? she says, but that purr-of-the-moment decision changed her life. The response was so unexpectedly overwhelming, with people wanting to know more about the cats, that she now uses her blog, www.AlexandriaBrown.blogspot.com, to post photos and share personal tidbits.

?It's amazing that when you share your personal life, people will respond to that,? she says. ?Customers buy from people they know, like and trust.?

The real cat's meow, however, turned out to be a book Alexandria wrote when her quest for information on e-zines proved to be fruitless. By that time she had several thousand people on her mailing list and when the news of her book reached them, ?that was the moment my life changed,? she says. ?I suddenly realized the amount of money I could make was no longer linked to the number of hours I worked.?

Eventually Alexandria focused on a specific target group ? professional coaches - dividing her business among three revenue streams: products, live events, and coaching. Her offerings now include not only e-zines and e-books, but also printed manuals and kits.

Building a client list ? the backbone of any information marketing business ? is ?fairly straightforward,? Alexandria notes. ?Most small business owners are already out there promoting their ventures. What they should be doing is collecting people's names, e-mails and mailing addresses. For example, when you're speaking at an event, offer a free drawing of your product onstage. This way you can collect hundreds of business cards at one time.?

Today, the ?E-zine Queen? raves about the life ? and freedom - information marketing has given her. ?I am a big vacation person and go away a lot,? she says. ?I can work from wherever I am if I want to.?

Another perk of info-marketing, Alexandria points out, is not having to face bosses or other employees every day. She uses a virtual team of five stay-at-home moms who play different roles in her operation.

Needless to say, Alexandria's business would not be as successful and lucrative if she didn't have a very effective website through which she sells her products and services.

One of the features she uses is an autoresponder ? an automated system that manages her e-mail list.

?Autoresponder is a ?must? for information marketers on the Internet,? points out co-author Skrob, president of the Tallahassee FL-based Information Marketing Association. ?It can be used to confirm orders, reply to customer service questions and, most important, to send follow-up e-mails to your unconverted sales leads. Autoresponders aren't free, and the more sophisticated systems can cost several hundred dollars per month. Still, that's a drop in the bucket compared with the cost of sending your e-mails manually or not sending them out at all.?