Blogger To Infoproduct Publisher: Are You Ready For The Next Step ?
Today, especially for us bloggers, I have two truths for all of us to learn, remember and profit from.
Truth #1 - Nothing in nature stays the same. If you are not getting better, you are surely getting worse.
I’m not sure who said it first, but it surley means more today than it did 2-3 weeks ago, to bloggers who want and need to profit.
Google is changing the way the search world works and is dropping sites/blogs from their AdSense program.I’m not opposed to either change, just for the record.
Truth #2 - No matter how good you are at what you do, there’s someone out there who can teach you something.
Again, I’m not sure who said it first, but the truth is still relevant to all of us. Blogs, pages of text, websites that don’t emply audio and/or video are slowly being phased to the bottom of the search results.
Don’t believe it ? Check this post done by Michael Gray. A video on How To Make Your WordPress Blog Search Engine Friendly.
No text, no tricks. Just good content that ranks well … in the form of a video, ahead of 887,000 other SERPS.
I’m sure he’s just as surprised as the rest of us.
What should you, as a blogger, do with this new info ?
First and foremost you need to add info-weapons to your marketing arsenal. You need to leverage your knowledge and expertise into infoproducts.
You need to add audio and video products to your content creation strategy.
I’ve lined up James Roche,The Infoproduct Guy, to help us all learn easy and quick new ways to create infoproducts.
We’re going to hold a teleseminar ( webcast ) and we’re going to allow you to control the agenda by asking questions.
I’ve set up a page that will allow you, as a blogger, to get answers from James that will help you get past any stumbling blocks you have that prevent you from creating a profitable infoproduct.
James will help us understand more about how to:
1) Make money with infoproducts
2) Select the right topic for our infoproduct
3) Develop content … fast
4) Avoid the mistakes that will doom our infoproduct to nowheresville
5) Put the actual product together
And much more. So click thru and ask James any question you have and as soon as we get it all assembled, we’ll show you where to sign up for the free, educational, informative teleseminar / webcast.
If you don’t have flat-fee phone service, my teleseminar service will allow you to listen over the web … at no charge to you.
Thanks for assisting us and asking questions.
Big Eighties Band Teaches Marketers The Value Of Split Testing
” Some like it hot and some sweat when the heat is on.
Some feel the heat and decide that they cant go on.
Some like it hot, but you can’t tell how hot til you try.
Some like it hot, so let’s turn up the heat til we fry. “
A friend of mine is a software programmer/coder/marketer. He’s building a new split test product and I asked him to make sure it can run A/B/C split tests and not just A/B split tests, because many moons ago, I started trying a routine that I’d never heard of, but am sure somebody before me has tried.
It’s kind of the “Goldilocks and The Three Bears” type of split tests.
You know the old story. Goldilocks broke in, which is still be a misdemeanor in most places, “borrowed” some of the Three Bears things and then ran off.
In one instance, she gobbled porridge. One bowl was too hot, one bowl was too cold and one was just right.
Your ads, your sales letters, your landing pages, etc., are judged the same way by the people who read them.
Each market has a different tolerance for hype, hence the “Some Like It Hot” reference.
Some tolerate, even like, a lot of hype or heat.
Some want cold, technical details and calculations.
Some need, or want, audio, video, testimonials, social proof, etc.
Some like a balance of every possible element, hence, they want it just right.
Before you bother trying a new headline, before you replace Tahoma with Courier, before you change from red to blue, before you try with or without audio, photos, video and any other item that all good marketers split test, try this:
1) One landing page, ad or sales letter with all the hype you can generate.
2) One landing page, ad or sales letter with all the cold, calculating data you can dig up.
3) One landing page, ad or sales letter with a balance of all the elements.
The results may surprise you. Don’t be afraid to try hype (heat), as some markets that haven’t been blasted with way over the top marketing messages have been found to respond well to hype (heat).
Other markets, who have been typically hyped to heck, have been found to respond well to cold, calculations, data and charts, case studies, white papers, etc.
The moral of today’s story is this:
Online marketing split testing is very, very inexpensive, as compared to what the old masters, such as Ogilvy, Schwartz and Hopkins had available to them.
So use ” The Powerstation Method of Split Testing “ and see if you can easily and quickly find out just how hot your market likes their porridge.
” Some like it hot and some sweat when the heat is on,
Some feel the heat and decide that they cant go on.
Some like it hot, but you can’t tell how hot til you try,
Some like it hot, so let’s turn up the heat til we fry. “
The Pet Shop Boys Make Marketing Easy
So now you’re wondering how the heck I’m gonna tie the Pet Shop Boys into marketing.
One simple phrase: Joint Ventures
Remember the song the Pet Shop Boys released in 1985 titled Opportunities ( Let’s Make Lots Of Money ) ?
Here’s the marketing tips they gave us :
” I’ve had enough of scheming and messing around with jerks. My car is parked outside, I’m afraid it doesn’t work.
I’m looking for a partner, someone who gets things fixed,
Ask yourself this question: Do you want to be rich ? ”
I’m adding several people into the mix around here in the coming months. All of them will be joint venture partners in one way or the other.
I can only teach and reach so many people. Only so many will listen to my stories and catch the nuggets of wisdom inside.
By adding different voices, and voice will be the key since a LOT of it will be done by teleseminars and webcasts, I feel like we can all add some marketing weapons to our marketing arsenals.
” I’ve got the brains, you’ve got the looks,
Let’s make lots of money.
You’ve got the brawn, I’ve got the brains,
Let’s make lots of money. “
We all have different talents, skills and abilities. I happen to be a great refiner of marketing strategy. Just this past week I helped 4 people see avenues they never thought of. Gave them ideas as to how they could reach more people, more easily and end up making more money by doing so.
In turn, every one of them gave me ideas back. Suggested things I hadn’t though of.
All at no cost, since I have flat rate phone service.
By combining their brawn, their skills, their unique abilities and the tools I have available to help them showcase those talents, we can partner up and help each other.
No man, or woman, is an island. The more people you bring into you marketing mastermind or brainstorm group, the more ideas that become reality.
As bloggers, we need to reach out and form joint ventures with those who can help us and who we can help.
As marketers, sometimes we forget that our competition has a list of customers that will buy what we sell. All we have to do is allow our competitor to profit from the alliance.
You may not believe it, but 100% of nothing is still zero.
50% of whatever you competitor sells for you, is still more than zero.
” You can tell I’m educated, I studied at the Sorbonne.
Doctored in mathematics, I could have been a don.
I can program a computer, choose the perfect time,
If you’ve got the inclination, I have got the crime. “
There are some very talented people out there who don’t know everything you know.
You don’t know all that they know either.
Put those two educations, experiences and efforts together and you have a bigger, better and brand new outlook on any topic.
Don’t be afraid to join forces, if only for an ebook, an interview, a podcast or a teleseminar.
You don’t know what can come out of it. And you won’t unless you reach out and ask.
I’ll show you the first of four joint ventures I have already set up in a day or two.
In the meantime, reach out and ask someone who writes or speaks about the same topic you have knowledge of and set up a phone call between you and them.
You’ll be surprised at how much you might have in common and the two of you may just be better as a duo, than you are as a single voice.
If you just can’t figure out who to ask, or you don’t know what you could create if you did, send me an email to mike *at* simplenomics.com and as I have time, I’ll try to suggest who you might contact and what you could create if you did a joint venture.
If Tim McGraw Was Your Sales Manager
Every now and then, selling for a living can wear you down.
When that happens, all of us could use a little pick me up from our Sales Manager. Sadly, we never get what we need, when we need it.
If you’re a little bruised and battered from rejections, cuts in gross margins, escalating manufacturing costs that you can’t pass along and the usual day-to-day problems we face as sales people, then come along with me as we find a Sales Manager that will “pump us up“, as the old Saturday Night Live routine so eloquently put it.
Tim McGraw, a singer of country AND western tunes ( that’s a pun, in case you missed it ), has a song out called Last Dollar (Fly Away). It’s on his newest CD, titled ” Let it Go “.
Some of the lyrics will work well for us and our needs here and if Tim was our Sales Manager, we’d stay all pumped up and ready to go.
” Since I ain’t got nothin’, I got nothin’ to lose. “
” If I ain’t got nothin’, I got nothin’ to hold me back. “
” There’s nothin’ worth keepin’ me from the places I should go.
Obviously, these should free you up to go after those new accounts and spend less time calling on accounts that already see enough of you.
You can try and convince yourself that they need to see you for the third time this week, but the truth of the matter is that unless you try to expand your account list, your treading water at best and probably sinking slowly, whether you admit it or not.
Nothing in sales stays the same. If you’re not getting better, you’re surely getting worse.
If Tim McGraw was your Sales Manager, he’d tell you to go after new business with a vengeance.
He’d tell you that you’re not losing anything and potentially gaining a lot, when you stop by the offices of some of your competitions best customers.
He’d be there to tell you, ” Good try. No harm done. Try another one tomorrow “, when you didn’t get any new business.
Actually, ol’ Timmy just might have a good career waitin’ for him, if this singin’ thang don’t work out 
What Business Person Would You Like To Have Lunch With ?
I just read part of the news article about some guy shelling out over $600K to eat lunch with Warren Buffet. Proceeds went to charity.
That made me think, which is sometimes hard to do, as I’m usually behind where I want to be, by about 8-16 hours.
Some people are serial entrepreneurs, I’m a serial idea guy.
I have 1-200 good ones every day and don’t have a big enough staff to put them all in motion.
If I ever figure out how to sell all the ones I can’t use, I’ll be retired, seeing a scene like this every day.
But for now, all I can think is about that lunch. Who would I pay an enormous sum like that to eat lunch with and what 10 questions would I ask them ?
How about you ?
Who would be the one business person you’d want to pay to eat lunch with and what would you ask ?
CEO’s Need A Stupidity Detector
You and I both know it’s true. Almost every CEO out there needs some to stand up and say, ” That’s stupid. ”
A stupidity detector, in other words. Someone who can’t be fired for telling the truth.
Someone who will not say yes, when the answer should be no.
If you’re like me, you’re a customer more than you’re a salesman. Every day, I buy from more people than I sell to.
Breakfast, coffee, newspaper, lunch, afternoon pick-me-up drink, such as a tea from Starbucks, dinner, range balls at the club, new shoes, micro-fiber shorts or slacks, new Tommy Bahama silk shirt off eBay, ink carts from Staples, razor blades, socks, etc.
Most of the CEO’s of these companies needed someone to tell them, ” That’s stupid “, when they came up with some of their policies, ad campaigns and slogans.
We, as a group, can come up with some help for these poor over-worked CEO’s who need a stupidity detector around to help them see thru the evil plans of some of the ad agencies that bring these stupid commercials to them for approval.
Someone to say ” Not a freakin’ chance ! “, when a graphic design company brings in some ugly-ass logo.
We can help them Just Say No to an idiotic slogan.
We can help them change some of the policies that say, ” We think you’re stupid ” to their customers.
How can we help ?
By blogging about every instance we find where a stupidity detector could have prevented the sad circumstances.
By writing a paper or creating an info-product of some kind detailing their needs for this new breed of corporate hero, hereafter called the VP of Stupidity Detection.
When you find an instance of need for us to guide the CEO of the offending company, send me the details and I’ll have our ownVP of Stupidity Detection, that would be me, contact them and offer his guiding hand in removing the offending circumstance.
You can post it on your own blog/site, you can comment or Trackback here, you can email me, whatever turns your wheels … Just Do It !
7 Simple Steps To More Effective Self-Management
Salesmen turn into Sales Managers, who turn into Vice-Presidents and then into CEO’s.
Why do sales oriented people make the best managers of people ? Because to be successful sales people, they have to learn how to manage themselves, their co-workers and their customers.
Managing yourself is the foundation to this whole building project. Unless you learn to manage yourself, you’ll not have any co-workers to manage, let alone any customers.
Self-management is an art. It’s one that few sales people learn enough about. The one’s that do are the one’s that rise to the top of the ranks and eventually they’re placed in the leadership of others.
Here’s 7 Simple Steps To More Effective Self-Management :
1) Do the things that count. Don’t waste your selling time on things that you can do on your off time. If you ever form this bad habit, you’ll find it hard to break.
2) Never give yourself an alibi. Face the facts. Face the truth. Face the music.
3) Don’t Blame Others. Take the heat you create. Don’t look for a fire fighter to put out your fires, do it yourself. Another bad habit you don’t want to form.
4) Be honest with yourself. If you want to listen to a kidder, turn on the Comedy Channel. In business or in life, if someone tells you that you stink, they’re not kidding, they’re trying to help you. Believe ‘em.
5) Don’t be a slave to fads or whims. Stick with simple, tested, tried and true methods and work them like a borrowed mule.
6) Be firmer with yourself than you are with anyone else. If you want to get tough with others, practice on yourself first … and then you may not have to bother the others.
7) Boss yourself more than you do others. If you want someone to toe the line, be an example, not an exclaimer. ‘Nuff said.
7 simple maxims, truisms or whateverisms to live and work by.
Feel free to add to the list, afterall, your life’s been on a different road than mine and we haven’t even driven the same number of miles, much less the same route.
How to Tell a Story that Sells Your Product or Service
I subscribe to so many ezines that I can’t even count ‘em. Mostly, I read ‘em to “swipe” marketing ideas, find new catch phrases or as idea generators.
Every once in a while, someone will actually write something worth reading, like the author of today’s guest post did in his ezine a couple of days ago.
James Roche has branded himself as ” The Info Product Guy ” and has lived up to that name by helping multiple people finally write their first info product or refine their existing info product.
I’ve been involved with that type of marketing for a few years, so when James came on the scene, I quickly got on his list and have been reading his material for quite some time.
I recently contacted James for the first time and he answered that email very promptly, which is always a good sign. I asked James if he’d allow me to reprint one of his articles, as I see several other bloggers writing about this topic, as I did many months ago.
James was kind enough to allow us to use his work and sent me a copy of the article and a bio box to go with it, so today we’ll be hearing from James Roche, ” The Info Product Guy “.
Storytelling is the most underutilized tool in marketing. Yet storytelling not only makes it easy for people to get to know, like and trust you … it also increases sales !
Think back to a speaker you heard at a seminar. What do you remember about the talk ? The theory ? The principles ? I doubt it. The bullet points ? Maybe. But I’m willing to go out on a limb and say you DID remember the stories the speakers told.
… That’s because well told stories create images in our minds that last for years … even decades.
I remember hearing John Robins, author of “ Diet For A New America ”, speak at a heath fair in Central Oregon. We were in a large park surrounded by a forest. The sun reflected off a huge white tent crammed with over 2000 people listening to his every word. People sat up breathlessly – straining to see John way up there.
I was amazed … all these people and nobody moved … and all he did was tell stories. He was riveting.
… and droves bought his book and supported his organization. It was brilliant salesmanship at its best.
I’ve worked with dozens of coaches one-on-one to help craft their “ Core Story ” – the story you leverage in your marketing materials to build credibility and build trust. Here are the three essential elements that make up stories that persuade, captivate and sell:
1. Use the P.A.R. Formula
Don’t try to be clever in your storytelling – stick to this proven template for best results. P.A.R. stands for Problem, Action, Results.
First, state the problem you faced. What wasn’t working and how did that feel ? Second, tell what action you took. What was the epiphany that changed your life ? What was your “ah-ha” moment ? Finally, what was the result of the action you took ? Be specific using numbers and real world results. Tell how you felt now that things are so different from when you had the problem.
2. Paint a Picture
The best stories cause the listener to see pictures in their mind’s eye. It’s those pictures that burn in our memory and make us remember a story years afterwards. Here’s how it works …
Pick a very specific moment in time that represents the pivotal moment of your story. Scrap everything else leading up to that point – just cut to the chase. Now, as you tell the story create the picture in YOUR mind’s eye and pick just a couple details to tell us about.
Maybe it was the tightness of your breath, the blue paint chipping off the door you opened, the squishy sound under your shoes … just enough to paint the picture. Don’t over do it ! Let the listener complete the picture in THEIR minds. That’s your goal.
3. Have Your Story Teach a Principle
This is the big marketing secret few use … tell a story that also teaches a core idea behind your service, product or program. Nobody likes to be lectured to … so don’t. But we all love a good story.
For example, I often share the story on how I made $9,000 in one week using a 25 page Special Report at a networking event. The story is interesting AND educational because I share step by step how to use direct response marketing. (i.e. moving a stranger to a friend, a friend to client and a client to a champion.)
Still don’t believe me on the power of storytelling ? Let me ask you something … I just shared good information for you. But what do you remember most ?
Okay, maybe it was the last bullet point … but tomorrow morning when you think of this article again, I’m willing to bet you’ll remember the brief story I told about listening to John Robins talk in the park.
That’s because you probably saw a picture in your mind when I painted the picture: “ …large park surrounded by a forest ”, “ The sun reflected off a huge white tent ”, “ …people sat up breathlessly ”.
Even though I was there and you weren’t – you still participated in the telling of the event. You saw your own picture … and you’re more likely to remember the principle behind the story: storytelling sells !
It’s as if we both shared a moment in time … you and me. THAT’S the beauty of storytelling.
James Roche, ” The Info Product Guy “, has developed an easy way to create e-books, audio programs, teleclasses, and other information products. In only 3 steps you can create a money-making marketing strategy and info product guaranteed to get you more clients and passive revenue … without thinking so hard ! Click this link now to get his free Special Report, ” 3 Secret Steps to Creating An Information Product That Makes You Money “
