Enterprise Nation

Murray Newlands has three ways in which he earns his income; word of mouth marketing, inbound marketing and affiliate marketing. We hear a bit about all three in questions that delve in to the story of Murray Newland’s business success.

Have you always been your own boss?

I started off as a Solicitor working for a regional law firm so have worked for others. I started working for myself by taking one day per week off for holiday leave which had accumulated and doing business meetings in those days. Very soon I had my first company.

What do you do for a living?

I feel lucky to have multiple revenue streams; it helps me to sleep at night. My Marketing Blog carries paying advertisers and is a source of social media consultancy work. I run an affiliate network and work as an affiliate myself. While focus is important having multiple income streams gives security, this means that no one client reducing their business or making a change affects me too much.

What is affiliate marketing and how can people get involved?

Simply put, affiliate marketing is where one website owner rewards another for passing a user who makes a purchase or becomes a lead. If you have a website which gets lots of traffic which in not necessarily suited to your main company objectives you can find other products or services to promote.  There are also simple scripts you can setup on your own site to track other people referring traffic to your site and you can encourage and reward them for generating sales for you.

What is the one thing you most enjoy about running a business from home?

I work hard and like to be able to concentrate on what I am doing. There are enough distractions with my phone going let alone other people around me!

What can we expect to see from you in 2010?

I have decided to start three new sites to separate out the areas I work in: word of mouth marketing, inbound marketing and an affiliate marketing blog. I’ve made this separation to enable me to go into more detail in those areas. I have also started to get approached to speak at events about social media and blogging, which is great fun and good for growing a client base so hopefully you’ll be seeing lots of me in 2010! 

• Murray Newlands