Why is everything so damned difficult? How about some help?

Artwebster,

First, change how you're thinking...

You're selling yourself a line that isn't actually the truth.

Underneath the buzzwords, marketing something online is very similar
to marketing it offline... ...there's often just a lot more noise and
misinformation to wade through.

BUT...

...there are also many, many more opportunities. Start seeing them,
and start acting on them.

99.9% of things are not new. The underlying principles remain the same.
Marketing is marketing is marketing...

...take it from someone who tends to over-complicate things: keep it
simple!...

If you believed that, say, only Pay Per Click advertising existed as a
marketing outlet, then your brain would probably have little issue
focussing on that single way of marketing.

Pick just one or two of the methods you mentioned, plan out a strategy,
and focus on them until they bring results (which ideally you measure
and refine).

Unclutter your head, and (ironically) take it out of this forum - at least
for now. Yes - there are fantastic brains and ideas here, but there is also
an abundance of "noise" from people who mean well, but are ultmately
explaining how to make a million while working in a burger-joint 6 days
a week [exaggerated example - no offence intended to the hard workers
of the fast food industry].

In your confused and exasperated state you'd be better off (imho) getting
yourself into the Private War Room and picking ONE of the golden eggs of
advice from Allen Says and sticking to it.

See? That's no different from the offline world.
Just remember how many rejections people like Colonel Sanders and Edison
picked themselves up from before succeeding.

This is why you need to start with how you see things.
Change your thinking. Change your actions. Change your results...

...and do not give up!

I wish you luck on your journey towards success.

Adam

Hi Art,

I can totally relate to the frustration and information overload in general, I'm going through exactly the same thing right now - I did however get a great deal on dog food last night at Wal-Mart, 14.97 for 44 pounds so mine will be okay for a week or so!

Seriously though, since you have original material and everyone seems to be looking for plr stuff, why don't you sell it as a WSO? Unless of course you want to keep it for yourself to write an ebook, set up a website or squidoo lens, submit articles, or any of the tons of other ways there are to make money with good content. It just seems like a WSO would be a quick way to make it profitable if you were so inclined.

By the way, Adobe is offering a free 30 day trial of Acrobat 9 Pro, which makes it super easy to create pdfs, if you don't already have it.

Good luck to you. By the way - do they even have Wal-Marts in Spain?

Tina

I think your ideas are solid and your writing is good -- but it's interesting that you're trying to sell something to offline businesses, online. Are offline businesses looking for that information online? Have you done the research to be sure there is a market for that information... however valuable it might be?

Some suggestions:

• Think through your sales angle. Why would someone be searching for this kind of content online? Perhaps people looking for business education and resources? People trying to learn how to pitch ideas? "I don't have time to get an MBA -- can I find stuff online?"
• Consider additional uses for the same information, with a little re-angling. Could you teach "old-school acumen" to new school marketers? "How to take your online business skills offline for face to face meetings?" "What online marketers NEED to learn from offline marketers?"

Hope that helps a bit.

This sounds like a perfect product for a very successful WSO, Art.

It will cost you $20 to do it... and you'll build a list of BUYERS who like your style and what you have to say.

I have no doubt that what you have to say in that 9,000 word report is well worth $27 to just about anyone serious about trying to close offline business.

If you ran the WSO for $7 for the first 20 buyers, you'd have testimonials coming fast and furious, bringing you MORE sales. Make it $17 for the next 20, and $22 for everyone else after that.

Create a blog to sell it for $37 and write articles about each chapter to generate some traffic and backlinks.

You know all this... DO IT!

You're writing is great... Even if you are a crabby appleton.

Best,

Brian

I think you got the perfect advice in the first 2 responses. Stop worrying about what ANYBODY else is doing or saying, and create a WSO.

Keeping YOUR product from being lumped into the rest of the effluence is the job of your offer copy - and then of the testimonials that will be posted by the purchasers of the product.

Tim

My suggestion, and I'm new, is just start doing it. Now I'm marketing a course that I'm making and I too have been suffering from overload. Because my product is what I've been doing offline for 7 years I can think of the product, but internet execution is hard for me. Too many competing banjos telling you how to do PPC (like my name), SEO, and product development or affiliate stuff.

Now I know I won't be an affiliate guy, but my suggestion is you will learn more by doing than learning.

Hi, Brian,

I have no doubt that what you have to say in that 9,000 word report is well worth $27 to just about anyone serious about trying to close offline business.

If you ran the WSO for $7 for the first 20 buyers, you'd have testimonials coming fast and furious, bringing you MORE sales. Make it $17 for the next 20, and $22 for everyone else after that.

Now here is a great methodology and I can see how it would work for somebody who has re-arranged the wording and run through an ebook with a thesaurus but it takes no regard for the actual value of the product.

Everything on the internet used to be $97. That was the bench-mark price before masses of regurgitated material started to surface as 'my latest product' and, slowly, the bench mark has changed and fallen to $7 and $27 - even worse, to 'free - but join my continuity programme'.

One young lady who has followed my report because, not being an internet marketer she knew no different, has earned over $12,000 in four weeks! Admittedly, she decided that she wasn't going to charge as little as I suggested, but would have earned $8,500 even if she had!

I am waiting for a testimonial from her but she assures me that the reductions she has made in the expenses of her clients amounts to much more than she has charged them - so both parties have made a financial gain.

Once she gives me the break-down of results for the period I will publish them and those of a couple of internet marketers who are not doing quite so well (because they know too much?) but still earning over $1000 per week each and seek further advice on price structure.

So, how does your report differ from the strategies that you claim rips off small businesses?

My report shows a marketer how to save money - immediately - for his client. Even a spend of €25 per week can be reduced to €12.14 per week AFTER paying the marketer!

Does your report not suggest using any IM strategies?

No.

If you don't think that small businesses can benefit from IM strategies, you might have a hard time selling to IMers who are consulting small business owners.


On the other hand, if your report delivers the goods, it might be a good that it doesn't compete with the existing Offline Biz products. Ask the Offline Biz gurus/trainers (David Preston, Andrew Cavanagh, Willie Crawford, Keith Boisvert, etc.) to JV with you and recommend your report to their lists.


You didn't say what you feel would be a fair price for your report, but you should charge whatever you think it's worth. If it's 1000.00, charge 1000.00. Just make sure you can convince the buyers of that.


You've gotten some great advice so far. Has any of it been helpful?


~oneEmpowered

Thanks to everybody who has replied.

I see that there is a huge chasm between the alternate strategies suggested.

It seems that I have not get the message across that what I teach is intended to give internet marketers an easy and profitable way to serve businesses in their local communities.

What I teach requires some basic IM skills but has nothing to do with IM, although there is an opportunity with every client to go back later and sell IM services.

My report simply teaches HOW to use basic skills to earn a very good income with no fear of failing to 'produce the goods' - cash savings and, probably, more customers - and secure the future with residual income.

I think your making it all to hard.

Businesses don't want to read 9000 word reports they just want you to do the work and they want results.

They have 2 questions.

* Get me as Number 1 on Google
* Get me more traffic

Sort out an easy system to do this and you can ask what you want.

Me - I build a competing site and overtake them in most cases very easily and then ask what I want.

Quentin

The reason most $27 ebooks are incomplete is to allow for upsells on higher priced products, you will need to do the same with your report...

A portion to set the initial response either free or low cost, then upsell the complete report. Try getting it put onto MP3 as well its relatively low cost to do that and it adds thud value to th main report.

There is no way around this people you need to set some cheese in the trap to get peple to buy your main product, thats how marketing has always been, online or off

Art Quentin is right... they dont want to learn how to do it they want you to do it for them, so now you have 2 upsells the complete how to with mp3's and you physically doing it for them.

Old adage in sales... never give them everything, always leave them wanting more

Hi, Robert,

I agree with much of what you say but, if I want a bicycle, the last thing I will do is buy two wheels and wait for the upsell of a frame, pedals and a chain.

As far as Quentins comment - I have always thought my English was straight forward and that I was easily understood. I get the distinct impression that he has not read anything that I have said.

My report, which is a complete 'how to' book, really, shows a semi qualified internet marketer how to walk in to a business and offer that business immediate cash savings (to repeat - I am not using any IM smoke and mirrors here - I am talking about the business REDUCING expenditure) while, probably finding new customers. To put it another way, my report is not for off line businesses but it is for semi qualified internet marketers. I don't want to sell it to businesses. It would not make sense to sell it to businesses. It does make sense to sell it to semi qualified internet marketers because it gives them the opportunity to secure local businesses as clients and, as they become more acquainted with IM stuff, be able to go back and sell other services as a trusted friend.

I have never, ever had a single businessman ask me to get him to Nº1 on Google. It is not his priority until some know nothing IMer goes in and does a snow job about being Nº1 on Google being important. I am Nº1 on Google for the term - red and yellow spotted paint - but not many people search for that term.

I have spoken to people who have asked me why being Nº1 on Google doesn't seem to help them. In every single case, they were only Nº1 on Google when the search term was put in quotation marks. Smoke and mirrors.

What is it that is so difficult to understand here? I can accept that it can be a good strategy to spoon feed a new IMer with bits of information over a period until he can put the whole thing together but I don't see the concern being expressed for his progress or the desire to really help.

What I teach is so bloody basic that I am staggered nobody else has done it years ago. Certainly I had been giving this service for over twenty years until I had to give up five years ago when my health crashed.

I live in the real world. This is a world in which a product is sold complete. I have never had to pretend that something I am offering is something that it is not so I will never make an internet marketer. I have never had to 'put cheese in a trap' because I have always had customers who were grown up enough to recognise a snow job when they saw one and experienced enough to know what they wanted and that they wanted it as a complete item - not the box and the polythene bag it should have been in..

This whole world of illusion, delusion, deceipt, trickery and sheer refusal to act rationally has me at a loss.

I have a product that I have used, that is being used today by people making $1,000 a week and that I expect to sell as a complete item but look at the advice I am receiving. It goes from give it away to break it up into bite sized pieces to pick a price but don't expect any body to buy it because they are used to stuff being given away or broken into bite sized pieces.

Do they go into a restaurant and ask the chef to cook their food in bite sized pieces? Do they even eat their meals, habitually, in instalments?

What is so difficult about bringing a simple product, which is an easy to follow comprehensive instruction book to market?

What is so difficult is this.
Slap an internet marketer round the face with a kipper and he will ask why you did it.
Slap an internet marketer round the wallet with bull crap, smoke, mirrors, illusion and fancy and he will think how clever that was and create a product or a report and give it away or sell it for $7.

Actually I understand exactly where you are coming from as I deal with offline businesses everyday and have done so for the past 10 years. I also have students I teach this stuff to and also teach orphans and young people in Thailand most of whom have done quite well.

QuoteI have never, ever had a single businessman ask me to get him to Nº1 on Google.

Then maybe you are not educating your clients properly. Do you want them to be on the front page of the paper or buried in the fashion section. SEO placement should be one of your strategies and red and yellow spotted paint is the perfect keyword if that is what your client sells.

On the internet it is frightfully different because there is always someone inventing a better way or adapting an existing way to be the 'best' possible medium.

That is a load of bunk and a myth. Business is business and has key components that have never changed. Good products, excellent service, value adding have always been the key components.

The only real difference with the Internet is the presentation. Everything else we see being sold is to aid in that presentation.

When I first approach a business they basically have no idea what its all about.

When I go into a business they want flash, bells and whistles and basically an online brochure and know absolutely nothing about IM.

They are looking for a web designer to make their site look pretty so when they show their wife or the board members they will drool and go wow but when the dust settles it is our job to educate them and present opportunities that they may not have considered.

So I break it down this way. I ask three basic questions.

1. What do you want?
2. What do you consider a good outcome?
3. How much is your budget?

They percieve the Internet as an all seeing, all knowing genie that is going to solve all their sales and staffing problems.

Now they wont tell you this but thats what they think.

I had a meeting with a big corporate client the other day and they showed me their new site but people were not reading the articles. They had all the right stuff, analytics, tracking etc.

The simple problem was that the titles of their articles meant nothing to their demographics. Management had had been told by the web design company that if they added content etc people would come and they had built them a beautiful site.

A few minor changes and the traffic is now rolling in and sales are up.

So after 15 minutes of them telling me what they think we start the education process.

What you really need to do is take them by the hand and explain what they need is something that will build a database for them of potential customers while servicing and building their current customer base into something where their customers become long term clients who will refer their friend, relatives and other business associates.

The internet is perfect for this.

This is not a web site but a system of integrated parts which all act together to add value to their current operation and provides logistics they can actually leverage off.

Selling your product is no different to the businesses you are approaching offline. If you just want some quick sales then you will be no different to everyone else and your course will be viewed the same of which there are thousands.

I know you think it is unique however I have rarely seen anything unique in the marketplace when it comes to business. There are people who can spin a similar concept in a way that makes it more attractive.

In the end its all about marketing and Bill Gates is your best example of this. Mac is a far superior product but Windows captured the market because of marketing. Beta cam was a far better system than VHS but the later won because of marketing.

I believe you may have a quality product which you can break it up into modules and offer it in a simple membership site with added functionality such as weekly coaching calls, additional posts addressing your members questions, topical videos etc.

Look at it this way. Your product sounds like a coaching product so you need to approach it like any other coaching business. Your students will be approaching businesses and many of them may have never done this before. You need to not only provide the material you have but be pro active in helping them over the hurdles.

What is your point of difference.

You have given us all the excuses but what is so different about your product.

Businesses today are a lot more savy and want a relationship with contractors that will provide service for the long term and not just some quick fix.

I have customers that have been with me for years and they refer all my work to me.

This is simply because they know I will help their business work the same as mine and see results which is what they end up looking at.

Approach selling your product online in the same manner that you are going to teach your students to approach their offline customers.

I hope I have not been to harsh but you asked for answers and I hope I have provided some for you.

A little counseling:

Get rid of the negative attitude and the I can't syndrome. Stop blaming everything else and do your thing. You obviously have enough nouse to get on this forum and type and been in business so put that to good use and be pro active.

What is there around that will help me get my product out there.
Who can I link up with to make this happen
What steps do I have to take (eat the elephant one........)

You have it all in your manual just put it into action and you told us its a great system so use it, prove it works and you will have customers begging you to tell them.

Quentin

Hi, Quentin,

A lot of sound advice there but you still haven't heard what I have said.

What I teach has nothing to do with internet marketing.

What I teach allows internet marketers to obtain clients who might want internet marketing assistance later on (important for those who don't know much at this time).

I have not spoken to a single businessman who did not have two priorities - cutting down on his expenses and finding more customers.

I am here trying to find ways to bring my report to market but I am not going to roll over and play dead just so that somebody can preach the latest IM litany over my corpse.

Just because I see some of the sacred cows for what they are, there is no reason to bring out that most fatuous of all accusations of 'negativity'. There is no such thing as being negative. I do not live through 24/7/365 chronic headaches and haemorhages by being negative - I do it because I have to in the same way that I question anything that is said to me that is insufficiently clarified or does not meet the basic test of sanity.

I am on a quest to get information. Much of what I have had so far is contradictory or too mantra-like in its delivery to be taken as stand alone information. In among the tares, though, some wheat does grow and I am harvesting it.

I am honest enough to accept that I do not know what I need to know. I am honest enough to debate and further question anything that I do not understand or which sounds so out in left field that I have to have it clarified further.

I am sensible enough to know that of all the active members on the Warrior Forum, those that respond to me will have something from which I can benefit.

Like a wise fisherman, I cast my net wide and far in order to furnish a banquet.

Hi, FG,

I am after information and there is no information that I do not like.

Your point about people trying to get away from face to face selling jobs is a good one but one which does not seem to be borne out by the evidence of these forums.

The give it away in order to sell someone else's inferior affiliate product seems to be a popular one but, what that tells me is that I need to be able to do more to create a reputation for myself.

Hopefully I will get some well known Warriors to test my report because the people who are earning money from it at the moment are unknown so won't carry much weight. The fact that I seldom know anybody giving testimonials for many products being offered to me is enough to warn me that I need 'names'.

I am certainly learning much about the internet marketing community and much of what I am learning is not to be proud of.

One thing I do know, there is not a single product that my report could be linked to as a bonus (even if I wanted to).

Hi artwebster,

I think your report could potentially add an interesting addition to those of us involved in the Offline niche selling IM services. Adding more to our arsenal than just IM services can only benefit our business and the local businesses we help.

I am sure your report is very good but the problem might be the trust that potential buyers will need before buying your report. Your idea of a testimonial from a well known warrior is in my opinion the best way to appraoch selling your report.

What do you feel your 10,000 word report is worth?

Baal

Hi, Baal,

These are the results of four weeks work-
Chantal - not in IM - earned $9300 initial and residual $1300 per month (Charged more than I suggested)
Terry - IMer - earned $4440 initial and residual $530 per month
Paco - IMer - earned $4130 initial and residual $495 per month

The number of new customers for each client that can be attributed to the work averages 7.

Two other IMers said they earned nothing but would not tell me how many pitches they made.

It seems that the less experienced IMers will work this but the two who earned nothing probably knew too much, were convinced it does not work or simply could not follow simple instructions. My feeling is that they didn't even try.

You tell me. How much would you pay for a product that enabled you to earn $1,000 a week in the real world?

(Note. Earnings have been converted from Euros at the rate of €1 = $1.27

I have heard that many offline businesses could expand their businesses by having an online presence. How one can help them as a resource is an interesting concept and may prove to be lucrative if one does their homework on any particular business and can add dollars to their bottom line.

Art,

If I'm not mistaken, what you're offering is instructions on how to become a 'Business Consultant' to those who have at least some IM training. If so, wouldn't your market be for those looking at self-employment or along those lines?

Going with that idea, I did a cursory google search and found several sites (some advertising with adwords) selling 'how-to' books ranging from 29.95 up to 97.00 and one course in the 495.00 area. There was much more but I just looked at a few.

The books were 'one-page' sales letter sites; with no opt-in... simply a buy button!!

I also checked out Boardreader - Forum Search Engine which currently lists over 11,000 topical posts from various forums. I have no idea how relevant they are, but maybe by checking along this route you will find some answers.

Carol

Hi, Carol,

If I'm not mistaken, what you're offering is instructions on how to become a 'Business Consultant' to those who have at least some IM training. If so, wouldn't your market be for those looking at self-employment or along those lines?

The training I give is very sharply focused on a single aspect of business expenses. It is an aspect which most businesses rely upon others for 'expert' advice on. The problem is that the 'experts' giving the advice also have a vested interest in ensuring that it is the most expensive solution that they provide and, just like internet marketers, they justify their advice with platitudes and questionable statistics.

Nobody following my training could even begin to claim to be a business consultant.

I've been having some fun. http:B.S.Free Zone Don't try to buy anything, the button isn't live.

Hi, Brian,

Commenting on the attitudes and mien of other marketers is not blaming them - it is commenting.

What I am doing here is fact finding. I am shoveling through the dross to find the gold dust but sometimes it helps if the dross is thrown into the air to let the wind (hot air?) separate the dross by blowing it away.

To do research properly, it is necessary to question, question and then question some more. The responses I have received have been helpful and are letting me see how I can create a scenario which will obtain best results by combining elements from some and partially ignoring others.

With my lack of knowledge and expertise I'm sure you can see that I don't even know enough to judge who to credit with most veracity - so I keep asking and I keep learning.

One thing I do not do is get exasperated if someone fails to see the point I am trying to make, I simply try to put matters right by finding out what I said that was obscure.

It is very strange that this is called the Warrior 'Forum' and yet discussion often appears to be an alien concept.

One man's discussion is another man's diktat?

So, Art how much do you want for the report?

You said some people are getting great results with it, how did the get it,free?

Do you have a sales page for us to see?

GL

John

Hi, John,

As I said in my reply to Brian, I am still researching but, obviously, I need to make as much as possible.

I think some of what I have said has led to apoplexic shock for some marketers because they simply cannot understand the power behind what I teach nor can they believe that a novice internet marketer can actually build a list of paying clients while still knowing very little about all the smoke and mirrors of IM.

Imagine how much easier it would be to survive online if you knew that you could go out and obtain paying clients and that you would be talking to them in the language that they understand, that you could actually demonstrate the exact savings they will make next week or next month and that after paying you, they are still making the savings you have shown them.

I gave my report to five people who I know from social sites. Two of them, I am now aware, did not take my training seriously and have done nothing but three of them have. (The two who have done nothing are now seeing the error of their ways and have started using what I teach).

I have been playing with a sales page B.S.Free Zone and while it is very tongue in cheek, I like it.

My current attempts are to get 'names' to honestly review the report but I don't see why I shouldn't charge one week's average income, do you?

Hi, Steve,

After five years of extreme ill health which has included the loss of use of an eye and the effective reduction of my working day to 2 - 3 hours I am absolutely stoney broke - current cash balance €0.87.

This is why I am being so persistent in my research and seeking help from others who can give 'recognised' support and/or testimonials.

My current position gives the lie to 'what goes around comes around' because part of the reason for my situation is my willingness to help others with time, money or both. Also, I do a lot of voluntary work in the world of stomatics.

Still, nil iligitimum carborundum, as they say.

The truth is there are 1001 ways to get to the same destination. To those having a problem with it, don't let information overload get to you. Pick 2 or 3 very reliable sources of information and stick with it. Especially in the starting phase, you don't need a whole library of books to refer to just the few reliable and proven ones. As you progress, you will undoubtedly find additional tools to add to your arsenal but if you limit the number of information source from the beginning, selecting the additional tools to fit your style is made much easier because you'll know what you want/need.

Hi, Steven,

What I teach is so very, very basic that once learned there is no need for on-going support. It is one of those little areas in business for which there is no competition and, once my methodology is revealed it's the end of the story.

There is a company who tried to recruit for me but they found that they could not find a way of enforcing loyalty and were simply arming their recruits to go it alone. That option is now discounted.

I'm sorry to hear about your wife but, as I always say, it might be threatening but threats don't do any harm. I wish her resilience and strength.

Art,

I really do feel for you and your situation. Seriously, and honestly.

Let me help you. I hate knowing that you are suffering in the way that you are.

If you will send me a copy of your report privately, I will correspond with you privately and we will work together to get this report into the market and make you some money -- immediately.

I will do this for no compensation. But my requirement is that you question NOTHING that I suggest and simply implement what I advise you to do. Of course, this will put the onus of failure on ME -- and very publicly at that.

I will do for you what you are not in a position to do. I recognize that your illness limits your abilities in some respects. I am 39 and healthy with no such limitations yet.

If this is acceptable to you, please get in touch via PM and we'll do it, together.

Best,

Brian

Hi Artwebster,

the most important thing to do is you must value your presence in internet marketing world. Don't just sit and relax. You must also know how to generate yourself into this internet business. " Don't get me wrong for this because I am also one of it".

The Old Coot will not be allowed to do any work until Monday - at the earliest - and has asked that I post this so anybody waiting for a response will know he has not ignored them.
For my point of view, I know how much he has been animated by this discussion and it has been very theraputic so my gratitude as wel. Qiqi