_Getting leads or prospects for your business is the eternal challenge for business, and there are a lot of ways of doing this. Of course the IDEAL approach is to attract people through some form of education, invitation, or other relationship.

The FASTEST way is to simply buy leads (or get them for free), but here you have the challenge of low-quality leads, how to reach them once you have them, or even SPAM issues. Here I'll teach you what I think you should offer leads and one option for free leads and mailing that eliminates problems of SPAM.

As I said, the ideal in creating prospects for your business is to educate, invite, and form a relationship. If you're buying leads, you haven't done any of this to create trust or a desire to do business with you. So if you're just hitting up purchased leads with a SALES PITCH, I believe you're going to do very poorly.

If you're going to sell, I recommend "selling" a FREE opportunity. (Like CashTexts or ViralPrint -- both free and very easy to understand.) This way there is no risk to the lead, and they have a chance to get into something with you and experience business with you. If they're new to business opportunities, they'll also get to see how they like it and whether it's possible to make money. Once you build a rapport with them, you can later introduce them to paid programs.

On the other hand, you can turn a paid lead into a relationship lead by NOT selling them on something right away. Instead, invite them onto a mailing list where you'll teach them about some topic; perhaps offer a free report for them to join the list; or don't make them join a list at all. Maybe offer a free e-book that educates before introducing them to a particular program that you wish to sell. Whatever you wish to GIVE them, you're now focused on the relationship before the sale.

Leads can be cheap or leads can be expensive. I have found that either type is difficult to "sell" to -- again, you want to first build trust. In any case, you want to find out how the leads have been collected before buying. What looks like an expensive lead might be cheap if you find that they're highly qualified. If you spend $100 on 15 leads but 3 of them join you in business, that's a lot better than spending $100 on 150,000 leads when only one joins you.

• Is someone a lead because their e-mail address has just been "scraped" off the internet by a robot?
• Did they fill out a form saying they were interested in a home business opportunity?
• Did they more specifically say they were interested in affiliate or network marketing?
• Did they more specifically talk about the topics they're interested in?
• What kind of money they're willing to spend? What kind of experience they have?
• How long has the lead been in the system? (Will they forget that they filled out a form?)
• Are they sold just once (to you) or to multiple people?

You get the idea. ...

At the very least, make sure the lead capture form got a time stamp and IP address to protect you from SPAM complaints. And if possible, you may want to work with a system that also e-mails to the prospects you've gotten so you don't have to worry about exporting, importing, verifying e-mail eligibility with another provider, problems with your ISP (Internet Service Provider), and so on.

I'm not going to say that there is just one lead source you should use. No way. A lead is a lead, and if you've looked at HOW they're collected and what they cost you, you can figure out the value for you. However, I do wish to recommend Advertyze.com because you can start out for FREE and put the system on autopilot so that you have the chance to build your business without thinking about it.

Click the link above to join for free and you'll get 50 FREE LEADS every week. They could be from anywhere in the world, so if you want U.S. or Canadian leads for instance, you'd need to upgrade to a paid account. At $49.95/month, they'll give you 5000 leads/week with the ability to select the country you're reaching. You do not get to keep these leads, but your message goes out to people as they come into the system, so they're very fresh. And you can "set and forget" a message that will continue to go out every week unless you change it.

If you like the idea of CALLING your leads and/or keeping them in your own mailing system so you can write to them many times, this is NOT the system for you. The nice thing about Advertyze is that it's inexpensive and automated, and you can get some response by sticking to free programs or free offers. Advertyze will also WRITE YOUR AD FOR YOU if you're uncomfortable with writing your own. There is no extra cost to this!

Of course if you join any of the programs I'm involved with, I usually have e-mails prepared for you to send. So if you join me in something, just ask and see what I have!