Newbie needs help

Bro, I was in the same shoes you're in now. You wear a size 9?

Seriously though, mentor or not, you should look and see what the successful people are doing. What are the key elements needed to be successful?

Well, here's a few things:

1) copywriting
2) SEO/marketing altogether
3) product creation (includes product research, market research, etc)
4) web design (includes graphics, hosting, domain registration)
5) continuity (includes product pricing, follow-up (autoresponders), up-sell/down-sell, etc.)

These are the 5 GENERIC elements you need. I'm not about to spend 20 minutes or more dwelling on what else there is to add. This was a 10 second thought process I'm throwing together here. No particular order of course.

Let me ask you, which ones can be hired out?

Can you hire someone to do copywriting? Yes, but it can be expensive. What's the alternative? Purchase pre-written sales letters. The plug-in sales letter stuff. I'm not going to say which ones as I don't want to give any free plugs. These can be fairly cheap. Ranges between $27-$97 compared to $500+.

Can you hire someone to do SEO/marketing altogether? Yes. This can also be expensive, but you can learn the basics and get by pretty good. You don't need a mentor to tell you that you should be marketing with blogs, social media sites, social bookmarking, blog directories, search engines and so on. There's just too much to cover. It's up to you to go out there and LEARN it. There's information out there you can learn for free or buy between $50-$97.

Can you pay someone for product creation? Absolutely. You can go to a place like elance or hireacoder.com and place a project asking for someone to research and create a product for whatever market. This ranges between $100 to a few grand. Still, very cheap alternative and saves you time.

Can you hire someone to do web design? Absolutely! This can be expensive, but there are people out there that can create a COMPLETE mini-site for less than $100. If you learn just a bit of HTML (a good book may cost $25-$35 and take you a week to 2 weeks to read - took me 3 days to learn HTML, 2 days to learn CSS). Of course, you could also buy a template once you have the knowledge and skills to do it. Domain name registration is about $6+/year and hosting can be as cheap at $5/month.

Can you pay someone to do "continuity" for you? Yes and no. I'm more-or-less saying no because it's based on what you want. Or just follow the guys you've been buying from so far. Do they have membership sites? When you order something, how does the OTO look and how does it communicate with you? These are things you should be looking at and learning from.

You can get an autoresponder service for about $20/month or pay for a script for about $197 and never pay monthly fees. They'll even install it for you.

So how much are you paying up to this point?

Let's see: about 50 + 50 + $300 + 30 + $66/year + $197. Your initial cost can be a bit under $700.

I spent $1,000 before I made 1 measly dollar! That was 8 years ago. That was doing it the hard way where I did EVERYTHING myself and didn't know a darn thing. No mentor, no instructions. If I knew what I know now, $700 would have been a bargain and I would have been making money much faster. Now, I'm able to create a product and launch in just 24 hours and see money in less than a week.

You just have to spend some time learning. I'm not saying to go out there and start creating products. Take your time. Keep your day job while you still have it and take some time here and there to learn more about the Internet marketing world. There's a lot to grasp so it's nothing to rush into.

So if you want to just learn, based in my short list, you can be paying about $130 or so. That's a well invested education. I knew a girl who had a double major in marketing and advertising but her occupation for 6 months was a babysitter!

Rdgrnr, I'm not sure if you can PM ( private message ) me yet. If so, do it and I will do what I can. Not knowing what you have in mind and where your possible expertise might be, it's hard giving advice. It sounds to me like you may have a Mentor, but Is he really a personal mentor? What is his expertise? What did you sign up for?

You have come to the right place, the WF! Just post a response of your site name
and blog without the linking and I'll check it out. Hope this helps!

Hey George, you mind updating your signature? You're using "Your" instead of "You're". While you're there, may as well uppercase the "always" .

RDGNR, I'd suggest, if you haven't already, investing $27 in access to the War Room Private Forum. There is seriously quality guidance available from the posters there. You've paid to get in, so they know you're serious, and there's some amazing business models just chillin' waiting to be taken advantage of.


If you don't have $27 to spend, check my sig for a few solid ways to make a one-shot-only quick couple of hundred bucks in the next week or so, and THEN pay for War Room access. It's so worth it.

Thanks to all who responded.
I guess I can be more clear on the mentor thing. I came across this person through one of the video products I was looking at. I watched a few of the videos, looked at his site, read the testimonials, etc. The guy seemed genuine, so I took a chance and asked him for help. He said he would do what he could to get me up and running. He wasn't charging me anything, so I felt it only right to subscribe (fee based) to his mentoring site. The site has some good content, and he appears to keep it updated on a regular basis. I'm just not sure at this point that my interests are what he has in mind.
As far as where I want to go with this, I really am not sure. My original intention was to get the needed basics in place, then decide which direction to take. My thoughts are to take it slow, try and avoid the pitfalls, and hopefully do this right the first time.
I realize that I am likely to fail a few times in order to succeed later, but I am willing to take those chances.
But just to be clear, what I am not willing to do is subscribe to more mentoring sites that offer "help", only to discover it's just another sales pitch. If I was looking for someone to sell me something, I would stick to the constant flood of emails I now have to sift through on a daily basis. I came here to learn, not to spend...

Hi.

I was in the same position a few months ago. Then I found a website by Mack Michaels. It's a club which you join. It costs $97 a month, but it is packed with fantastic information. But the good thing is, it's all done via video teaching, so even I could understand it.
It really is worth a visit:
Maverick Money Makers™ | The Original Money Making Club Since 1997

Try this site

The #1 Affiliate Marketing Training Portal | Affilorama

Plenty of free good guide.

Johnny,
Thank you for the info..I checked it out, and you are right. A LOT of helpful stuff there, especially for newbies. This is EXACTLY what I was looking for. Not sure on the affiliate stuff yet, but Mark's site looks like it may help in getting the ball rolling...thanks again

Just an update..I learned today to NEVER NEVER NEVER give out your user names and passwords to someone that claims to be willing to be your mentor. Even if you think you can trust that person after you have paid for the service. If that person tells you not to worry about things and everything will be set up for you..BEWARE!!! Ask for directions on how to do it yourself. Don't be conned into letting others "help you out" until you have spent some time checking out their credentials. WHY??? ...read on...
I tried to access my hosting account today, and found out it had been suspended because it was being used for phishing. It took some convincing and several calls to clear up that it was not me doing the phishing. There were files that I had no idea what they were for, so I was forced to delete everything, change passwords, and now I am more lost in my hosting account than when I started. I don't know what files were supposed to be there. I did send in a help ticket and hopefully this will get straightened out in a few days.