If you are new to IM, STOP DOING THIS

27 replies
This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make $xxx!

PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!

If I told you how many times I whipped out the calculator when I first started, and said "that's all I have to do", it would be in the hundreds.

If I told you how many times it actually worked out like I planned it to, it would be in the ball park of 0-1.

Things rarely go by the numbers, so your best bet is just hide the calculator until tax time and just get out there and hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

But maybe thats just me.
#stop
  • Profile picture of the author Keith Kogane
    I agree in part. I think for newbies it should be less about calculating how much you will make in the abstract. It's important to map it to your real world needs. So make a list of all your bills and expenses, and write down whatever the monthly spend is. Then, when you're taking action and building income streams, as soon as you have those expenses paid on an ongoing basis with your IM income, you scratch them off your list. When you do it this way, it will help you learn the value of many small recurring income streams. I learned that from Andre Chaperon, though I don't actually follow his earning method (Adwords requires too much attention for me). Now I'm following something I picked up from Frank Kern, which is *like* what you describe, but slightly different. You THEN make a list of the things you WANT, and write down their monthly cost. Once you're making enough to cover it, you go get it.

    This way, you pay for your current lifestyle first, and take things to 0. Once you hit that equilibrium with the passive income streams, it's such a great feeling. You basically are free at that point. Then you can quit worrying about money and actually start chasing down your dreams.

    But it's all about mapping your income to the actual items it will pay for. That takes it out of the realm of imagination and will help spur you on to action.

    Hope that helps!
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    • Profile picture of the author Eziseo
      Yes can't beat your own experience!! Lots of factors to consider and revenue sources for how to profit online
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  • Profile picture of the author Daniel Molano
    Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

    This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

    I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

    Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

    Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make !

    PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!

    If I told you how many times I whipped out the calculator when I first started, and said "that's all I have to do", it would be in the hundreds.

    If I told you how many times it actually worked out like I planned it to, it would be in the ball park of 0-1.

    Things rarely go by the numbers, so your best bet is just hide the calculator until tax time and just get out there and hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

    But maybe thats just me.
    Damn, I laughed so much when I saw this post because it is so true. I still do that!

    I agree with Christopher to some extent. There is nothing wrong with doing it once to set yourself a goal, but the most important part is not in that number.

    It's in asking yourself HOW you plan to achieve that number with an exact and precise plan of action to follow.

    If you follow that plan to the line, trust me, you will be achieving that goal.

    Also think in terms of the worst case scenario (that has been doing wonders for me). If I do this and that what is the worst possible case scenario in:

    1. Traffic
    2. Conversion

    Think stuff like 0.1% conversion and 10% of the traffic you think possible. And aim to that number of sales based on those worst case scenarios. You will see the results are actually much better. But you have to work towards those figures thinking of the worst possible results.

    For example: I need to make 10 sales a day. How am I going to make 10 sales a day IF my product converts at 0.1% and I receive 10% of the traffic I am actually expecting?

    That would mean you expect 100,000 visitors per day out of your work, but you will only be getting 10,000 and those 10,000 will convert at 0.1% giving you your 10 daily sales. Work towards those numbers and you will find yourself making much more than 10 sales per day.

    Do that and you will see miracles happen,

    - Dan

    P.S: Of course this would be a long term approach. But that, in reality, is the only way to actually make big bucks no matter what others tell you.
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  • Profile picture of the author Chris Lockwood
    Maybe they think that way because so many salesletters say things like "Just sell 10 a day at $27, and you'll make $270!" - as if the reader doesn't have a calculator.
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  • Profile picture of the author MaskedMarketer
    Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

    This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

    I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

    Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

    Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make !

    PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!
    Its always good to see the potential and I agree this is where a lot of time should not be spent.

    Most time should be spent improving the business- as you never know when a competitor will come in and steal your business...
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    • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
      Sorry, but I totally disagree.

      You need a business plan and that plan has to be based in reality.

      You can't say, "I want to make $3,000 a month" without having some idea of
      how it's going to happen.

      If you're putting together a $30 per month membership site then you're
      going to need 100 monthly paying members to make that $3,000. That's just
      simple math.

      Then, if you're testing your site and you see you are converting at 1%,
      you're going to need 10,000 uniques to your site each month. That comes
      out to about 333 uniques a day.

      If you're running an Adwords campaign, you better be spending less than
      10 cents per click or you're actually going to lose money on each member
      unless you have a backend to the site or some kind of upsell.

      If you don't know what you want to accomplish and how you're going to
      get there, you're going to end up broke and disgusted.

      I can tell you every product that I have, what I spend, what it converts
      and almost to the unit, how many I'll sell in a given month.

      Now granted, this didn't happen right away. But let me tell you, if I had
      a plan like I do now at the beginning, I would have been in profit a lot
      sooner than I was.
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      • Profile picture of the author MaskedMarketer
        Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim View Post

        Sorry, but I totally disagree.

        You need a business plan and that plan has to be based in reality.
        What? You're telling me this is going to take WORK?

        Won't the Law Of Attraction automatically bring my riches?

        JK JK JK JK JK

        ====

        I'd be interested to know how many people here have a plan or had a plan before they started?
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      • Profile picture of the author Jason Moffatt
        Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim View Post

        Sorry, but I totally disagree.

        You need a business plan and that plan has to be based in reality.

        You can't say, "I want to make $3,000 a month" without having some idea of
        how it's going to happen.

        If you're putting together a $30 per month membership site then you're
        going to need 100 monthly paying members to make that $3,000. That's just
        simple math.

        Then, if you're testing your site and you see you are converting at 1%,
        you're going to need 10,000 uniques to your site each month. That comes
        out to about 333 uniques a day.

        If you're running an Adwords campaign, you better be spending less than
        10 cents per click or you're actually going to lose money on each member
        unless you have a backend to the site or some kind of upsell.

        If you don't know what you want to accomplish and how you're going to
        get there, you're going to end up broke and disgusted.

        I can tell you every product that I have, what I spend, what it converts
        and almost to the unit, how many I'll sell in a given month.

        Now granted, this didn't happen right away. But let me tell you, if I had
        a plan like I do now at the beginning, I would have been in profit a lot
        sooner than I was.
        I agree with Steven here.

        It's very helpful to have a "CLEAR and PRECISE" goal in mind if you want to attain something.

        Those that write down these goals, and have targets to hit each day, week, and month will get a lot further then those aimlessly just "doing stuff".

        I don't even use dollars much anymore as a monetary system. Instead, I calculate everything in ebooks.

        If I want to buy a new guitar and my girlfriend asks... "How much does that cost?"... Instead of saying $729, I reply "It's only 7 ebooks!

        I look at everything in the amount of ebooks I have to sell. My mortgage payment is just x amount of ebooks, the utilities is just 1 ebook, and so on.

        So newbies, I'd encourage you to plot out exactly how many ebooks you'll need to sell in order to hit your goals.
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  • Profile picture of the author George Wright
    Hi,

    I was just getting ready to post something very similar to Steven's post, however, he said it better than I could so I'll take a little different tack here.

    Personally for me it's always about prediction. I guess it comes from the training I had in sales, insurance sales, pre-need sales and yes World Book Encyclopedia sales.

    Sales is an accurately predictable numbers game.

    If you keep records of now and the past you can predict the future with uncanny accruacy.

    The numbers don't ever fail in the long run.

    Generally, predictions can be made for any product at any price point with variations factored in based on the closing ability of the individual salesman.

    Now why would you want to know the outcome of your efforts?

    Motivation.

    If I know for a fact how many NOs I have to hear to get to a YES I can look each customer in the eye and and when they say no I don't have to hate them I can love them and sincerely say, "Thank you kind person," "You just got me one step closer to YES."

    Now I know there is no eye to eye contact in IM but my reasons for pulling out the calculator is because I learned early on that the numbers don't lie.

    George Wright
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  • Profile picture of the author Melody
    Gee - do you think that maybe the 'newbies' that operate this way have been brainwashed into it by all of the stuff the "IM Gurus" sell them??

    There isn't a major launch done that doesn't follow the basic formula of telling us that we cannot be successful unless we follow their exact program - and next week the next "big thing" repeats the same mantra! It all comes down to if you follow their XX steps you will be making XX dollars in XX days......so is it any wonder where this line of thinking starts?

    That being said - I agree with Steven on running your business in a methodical way. Rather than just do SOMETHING - I do SPECIFIC things - based on my initial results in a given niche, I know pretty much what I can expect based on certain actions, and if the numbers are high enough - I will launch more than one site in the same niche or sometimes, even different niches but the same style of site - because I know that I average XX per site - and XX sites will give me XX in revenue.

    And I am not a newbie - been doing this full time since 1996 - so my XXs are based on solid fact - not theory.

    It's simply good business sense to develop systems that can be repeated over and over with consistent results and little wasted efforts.
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    • Profile picture of the author Jason Moffatt
      Originally Posted by Melody View Post

      Gee - do you think that maybe the 'newbies' that operate this way have been brainwashed into it by all of the stuff the "IM Gurus" sell them??
      Hmmm, I've been doing this forever and I learned it from Tony Robbins and Frank Kern.

      Sometimes being brainwashed isn't so bad. Just depends who the washer is.
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      • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
        Originally Posted by Jason Moffatt View Post

        Hmmm, I've been doing this forever and I learned it from Tony Robbins and Frank Kern.

        Sometimes being brainwashed isn't so bad. Just depends who the washer is.
        Jason, I learned from hard knocks, but I sure wish I had a brainwasher.
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        • Profile picture of the author MaskedMarketer
          Originally Posted by Steven Wagenheim View Post

          Jason, I learned from hard knocks, but I sure wish I had a brainwasher.
          Why notbecome a brainwasher? You can benefit yourself and others.
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  • Profile picture of the author radhika
    Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

    This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

    I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

    Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

    Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make !

    PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!

    If I told you how many times I whipped out the calculator when I first started, and said "that's all I have to do", it would be in the hundreds.

    If I told you how many times it actually worked out like I planned it to, it would be in the ball park of 0-1.

    Things rarely go by the numbers, so your best bet is just hide the calculator until tax time and just get out there and hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

    But maybe thats just me.
    It is VERY VERY easy to calculate like above. But to be practical either one of the above is not easy as it sounds.

    We just have to start doing whatever it is and THEN should calculate ...

    .
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  • Profile picture of the author Melody
    From George:
    "If I know for a fact how many NOs I have to hear to get to a YES I can look each customer in the eye and and when they say no I don't have to hate them I can love them and sincerely say, "Thank you kind person," "You just got me one step closer to YES.""

    George, you have obviously been in sales a long time! LOL - that is one of the FIRST things you learn as a 'sales rep' and it is what keeps you going through all of the no's - because you know - by the time proven numbers - that every no just brings you closer to that yes.....it also keeps you from committing mass murder on 'one of THOSE days'...but that's another thread altogether...... ;-)

    And a positive attitude is what keeps you on the right track to taking positive action.....which attracts success.......unfortunately, in some circles 'positive action' is called by that 4 letter word...'work'
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  • There is a massive difference between saying "all I have to do is sell x many of this at x price and I'll make xx" and laying out a detailed business plan, and I'm surprised most of you felt the need to point that out.

    If you have a membership site, 100 subscribers at $30 a month hardly means $3000 a month. People don't pay, people unsubscribe, and you might get more referrals than you expected, my post wasn't entirely negative.

    Conversion rates vary wildly on how you get your traffic. If I told you how many people came to me and said "well the affiliate said it converted at 3%, I mailed out to my list of 1000 people and only made 2 sales".

    Notice I also said "IF YOU ARE NEW".

    Beginner don't know little things like open rates, actual click through statistics, how most traffic reporting (awstats) aren't terribly accurate.

    This is all true ESPECIALLY when working with micro management, in the beginning.

    Yes, now I can tell you that I'll spend up to $25 in ppc for a sale, because I know at the end of the day 1 sale to me is worth an average of $140, but believe me someone just starting doesn't have the experience to piece that together yet.

    The purpose of my post was to get out there, and try something. Don't sit at home and type up figures and expect that to actually happen. 2 years later when you've been in it for that long, yeah sure, go for it.
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    • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
      Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

      There is a massive difference between saying "all I have to do is sell x many of this at x price and I'll make xx" and laying out a detailed business plan, and I'm surprised most of you felt the need to point that out.

      If you have a membership site, 100 subscribers at $30 a month hardly means $3000 a month. People don't pay, people unsubscribe, and you might get more referrals than you expected, my post wasn't entirely negative.

      Conversion rates vary wildly on how you get your traffic. If I told you how many people came to me and said "well the affiliate said it converted at 3%, I mailed out to my list of 1000 people and only made 2 sales".

      Notice I also said "IF YOU ARE NEW".

      Beginner don't know little things like open rates, actual click through statistics, how most traffic reporting (awstats) aren't terribly accurate.

      This is all true ESPECIALLY when working with micro management, in the beginning.

      Yes, now I can tell you that I'll spend up to $25 in ppc for a sale, because I know at the end of the day 1 sale to me is worth an average of $140, but believe me someone just starting doesn't have the experience to piece that together yet.

      The purpose of my post was to get out there, and try something. Don't sit at home and type up figures and expect that to actually happen. 2 years later when you've been in it for that long, yeah sure, go for it.

      Chris, the problem is, it doesn't have to take 2 years. If new people are
      properly trained early, they can avoid all the hell that most go through.

      Imagine a doctor didn't get trained and just "winged" his first couple of
      years. We'd have a lot of dead people not walking around.

      I've said this for years and I'll keep saying it. We need a formal education
      system for IM just like we have for so many other things. And please don't
      say it's not possible. It is possible. There are basics to business planning
      and management as they apply to marketing online that could easily fit
      into a 6 month course.

      All a private or state college has to do is make it available online, spend
      the bucks to rank # 1 for keywords like "Home business startup", "Home
      business training" or whatever, and we'd gave fewer people spinning
      their wheels trying to make a buck online.

      And for those who can't afford it, they should be able to apply for
      financial aid just like somebody who goes to college to learn accounting
      or whatever.

      This is definitely doable and would help a ton of people.

      As well as force a lot of marketers to get out of the "how to make money
      online" niche because there wouldn't be the demand that there is now.

      This is what I would do if I had the power to do it.

      Maybe someday somebody will recognize the potential here and do
      something about it.
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  • Profile picture of the author Loren Woirhaye
    Steven - it's Direct Marketing - You CAN study it at colleges.

    But people want to "make money" - they don't give a crap
    about learning direct marketing.... mostly out of functional
    illiteracy or some sort of weird aversion to reading about
    how advertising works.

    I've seen it. I talk to people. Many are actually sort of
    proud of their ignorance. "I've never read a marketing
    book in my life" one man told me as he rushed to get off the
    phone with me as soon as I suggested he read "Scientific
    Advertising" so he could understand a little better what was
    going on here. I doubt he ever read it. Maybe he can't
    read. Apparently something like 30% of Americans are
    funtionally illiterate and I think the number is increasing.
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    • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
      Originally Posted by Loren Woirhaye View Post

      Steven - it's Direct Marketing - You CAN study it at colleges.

      But people want to "make money" - they don't give a crap
      about learning direct marketing.... mostly out of functional
      illiteracy or some sort of weird aversion to reading about
      how advertising works.

      I've seen it. I talk to people. Many are actually sort of
      proud of their ignorance. "I've never read a marketing
      book in my life" one man told me as he rushed to get off the
      phone with me as soon as I suggested he read "Scientific
      Advertising" so he could understand a little better what was
      going on here. I doubt he ever read it. Maybe he can't
      read. Apparently something like 30% of Americans are
      funtionally illiterate and I think the number is increasing.

      Loren, that's another problem altogether. Yes, I know all about the
      illiteracy rate in this country. My wife lives it as a high school teacher
      for over 25 years. She has kids who couldn't think their way out of a
      soda bottle.

      I guess I was referring more to the people like me who actually have
      some intelligence (I was a college grad) and just need some "formal"
      direction. There is none online, at least none that I have ever found. And
      when I graduated college, the crap I learned in business, finance and
      marketing didn't prepare me at all for the online world. So something formal
      for this medium would be a big help to those who have the smarts and
      the desire to absorb it.

      Hey, I could be totally wet here for all I know, but if a formal institution
      of learning this stuff was available online when I started, I would have
      avoided the 5 months of stupid decisions that I made and would have
      been in profit a lot sooner. Of that, there is no doubt.
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  • Profile picture of the author Loren Woirhaye
    There is so much technical stuff to "pick up" in this
    field too... and while you can outsource it at some point
    I know from my own experience that as my technical
    understanding has grown I've become more advanced
    in the way I think about, and do, marketing online.

    It's a vast field and there are dozens of good courses on
    it yet it's still easy to make bad judgements because
    there is so much freedom of choice and new information
    bombarding us.

    The only principles I see as proven in my own buisness is
    that email communication works and if you can manage that
    without dropping the ball you can probably make it.

    Yet a lot of people are bumbling around for years and not
    even having an email list or even an autoresponder subscription.

    So I'm ranting here. I think if people read Herschell Gordon
    Lewis's stuff they'd have a much easier time of it... and he
    teaches "mass communication" at the university level.

    I never do "profit projections" myself - I think it's B.S. to do
    so unless you have a lot of prior data. With direct mail
    you can, for instance, launch a plate series to a list of buyers
    who have bought plates in the last year - but in terms of
    making an ebook and throwing it out on the open market?
    Without an in-house list of proven buyers, or access to
    JV lists with proven buyers it's difficult to predict what
    will fly and what won't. It's clear though that we get better
    with experience and that knowing how your market thinks
    and what they like to buy is money in the bank.
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  • Profile picture of the author Melody
    Loren - there's quite a big difference between what the colleges teach as 'Direct Marketing' and what we practice in Internet Marketing. My youngest stepson just graduated from one of the top business schools in the country, and I was a guest speaker on more than one occasion for several of his classes - both in marketing and entrepreneurship - and I was amazed at how far behind the curve the instructors were in what we consider the 'basics' of IM. And one of the things that surprised me the most was how little this generation - that has essentially grown up with computers - really uses the internet for anything beyond the basics, and the majority of the instructors knew nothing about PPC, SEO etc or anything about building an online presence.

    A college course in DM will give you a good foundation to build upon - but there is still a huge gap between their teachings and our reality.
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  • Profile picture of the author Shannon Herod
    I guess I was referring more to the people like me who actually have
    some intelligence (I was a college grad)
    Well dang I thought I was smart! I guess my GED makes me an idiot.

    Please don't let my bank account know I am stupid though... It still thinks I'm smart.
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    • Profile picture of the author Steven Wagenheim
      Originally Posted by Shannon Herod View Post

      Well dang I thought I was smart! I guess my GED makes me an idiot.

      Please don't let my bank account know I am stupid though... It still thinks I'm smart.

      Shannon, this wasn't a knock in high school grads or dropouts. Some people
      drop out not because they're stupid but because they hate structured
      classrooms.

      But let's face it, some people are stupid, and I don't mean in the book smart
      sense. I mean they have no common sense, they have no ability to think
      through a problem, they can just about push a broom at a McDonalds. We
      can pretend these kind of people don't exist, but they do. I have had
      students who couldn't wrap their head around how to save a file in Word.

      But I don't want to get into this debate again because it ran 10 pages
      the last time and got nowhere, so for those who feel that anybody no
      matter what their IQ, education or whatever, can be successful business
      people, great.

      I hope for those people's sakes that you're right.
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      • Profile picture of the author Shannon Herod
        I was actually just playing. I would say I am an exception to the rule. I dropped out 3 months before graduation and had a 3.8 gpa.

        Got into some trouble and made an immature move. Luckily I went on to the military and then to college.

        Shannon
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  • Profile picture of the author jdmitchell
    Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

    This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

    I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

    Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

    Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make !

    PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!

    If I told you how many times I whipped out the calculator when I first started, and said "that's all I have to do", it would be in the hundreds.

    If I told you how many times it actually worked out like I planned it to, it would be in the ball park of 0-1.

    Things rarely go by the numbers, so your best bet is just hide the calculator until tax time and just get out there and hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

    But maybe thats just me.
    I thought I was the only one!

    When I realized what this really was, I stopped it immediately. You MUST plan, but I was doing it neurotically and using it as a crutch to avoid taking action. I believe what OP is saying, is to be careful not to fool yourself in thinking you are being productive by planning for 4 years.

    Every little change, or opportunity, I was busting out the calculator and masturbating with the numbers, as a REASON not to take action.

    Mental masturbation.

    I am glad I was not the only one that did this!

    JD
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    • Profile picture of the author MaskedMarketer
      Originally Posted by Loren Woirhaye View Post

      Steven - it's Direct Marketing - You CAN study it at colleges.
      We are all (or most) here in direct sales/marketing. That's what we're doing and you can learn that at colleges.

      As direct marketers we sometimes serve smaller niches that the colleges and other big institutions and companies ignore. Small businesses and marketers are usually ahead of the curve.

      IM is still new and it may be possible they will eventually have classes on it.. But as small businesses and entrepreneurs we're profiting now because we are able to move in quick and take advantage and a college is not always the same. They are slower to change.

      IM is a small, tiny, fraction of direct marketing in general. Knowing the foundation is more important than knowing how to do PPC , SEO, blogging, if you have no idea to set up a business plan/strategy.

      Sure, you can make money that way.. But will you really be building a real business, for long term growth and success.. Something that will outlast you?

      Originally Posted by Loren Woirhaye View Post

      But people want to "make money" - they don't give a crap
      about learning direct marketing..
      Loren,

      When in make money niches - I've noticed most people have a "lottery" mentality as opposed to a business mentality...

      Originally Posted by Melody View Post

      majority of the instructors knew nothing about PPC, SEO etc or anything about building an online presence.

      A college course in DM will give you a good foundation to build upon - but there is still a huge gap between their teachings and our reality.
      Melody,

      Direct Marketing instructors don't need to know that. They outsource it, because they know how to do direct marketing the most effective way.

      And like you said, a course in DM will give you a good foundation to build upon.... Well, the foundation is the most important piece of business!

      If you build a house on a weak foundation it can eventually crumble. The same is with your or any business...

      Building a business on a weak foundation and only knowing IM stuff like PPC, SEO, blogging, won't be as beneficial to building a business as knowing the foundations of DM.
      Signature

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  • Profile picture of the author spressnell
    Well, as a newbie reading these posts, it seems that both sides of this posting have merits. 1. Don't just assume that because you sell $10 a day, it will continue indefinitely. Keep monitoring it. 2. You can use the $10 a day as a goal to continue by finding the right steps to do that. 3. Don't believe all of the marketing messages you receive. Check into them and come up with your own conclusions.

    Shirley
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  • Profile picture of the author Golden101
    I'm a total newbie and I get my calulator out to dream about the money that I will be making. I haven't made any yet so I'm looking forward to the money part. Thanks for all of the great posts.
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  • Profile picture of the author Jason Moffatt
    Originally Posted by Christopher R Everson View Post

    This is quick, feel free to tell me if I'm wrong.

    I hear so many people say: "If I make x amount of sales at x price, I'll make x monthly! That's all I have to do!"

    Or, just make ten sites making $10 a day, and that's a hundred bucks a day!

    Or, if my product converts at x% and I get xxxx visitors, I'll make !

    PUT AWAY THE CALCULATOR, STUFF THE THEORY ASIDE, AND GO DO SOMETHING!

    If I told you how many times I whipped out the calculator when I first started, and said "that's all I have to do", it would be in the hundreds.

    If I told you how many times it actually worked out like I planned it to, it would be in the ball park of 0-1.

    Things rarely go by the numbers, so your best bet is just hide the calculator until tax time and just get out there and hope for the best, and prepare for the worst.

    But maybe thats just me.
    Hey Christopher,

    I don't want to diminish the main point you had in your post because I, like you encourage ACTION over just about anything.

    However, if you get very clear in your goals, it's much easier to attain them.

    It's not about duping some newbies. It's about getting someone to focus, and get laser targeted about what they want in their life. Those who know without a doubt what it takes to achieve their goals are the ones who tend to actually take the time to conquer them.

    Obviously a simple calculator and some happy thoughts aren't going to do anyone jack squat without implementing the "GO DO SOMETHING" part.

    But for some people, laying out a "Action Plan" helps them in the process to actually get to the point of "doing something". In fact, it's one of the most important parts of "doing something".

    I wouldn't discredit dreaming with a calculator. It can spawn some seriously great ideas and action plans.
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  • That's true, I've read all of these posts over and I've learned that if you have a strong idea that pops in your head on your way out of the door, wait until later and post a more elaborate expression of your real feelings.
    Signature

    Money isn't real, George. It doesn't matter. It only seems like it does.

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  • Profile picture of the author Ken Preuss
    And you dug up this month-and-a-half old thread why exactly?

    Ken
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    Coming soon for all you IM junkies... The Internet Daily Show

    A Secret to Success: Making serious money online or offline is not complex unto itself - we're the ones who complicate it. Simply sell them what they are already buying.

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  • Profile picture of the author Bruce NewMedia
    Ken, he dug it up so he could write a vacant comment and then drop his signature link....at least thats what it looks like.
    _____
    Bruce
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