I have to defend TheenD (Sort of)

A little while ago I read a thread he started stating that article marketing is a scam. To be clear - I 100% DO NOT believe this.

He was talking about an EZine author with over 24,000 articles published and went on with some assumptions for this persons income. I also DO NOT agree with his assumptions and think he missed the mark.

I also understand his frustrations with his attempts at article marketing, and I believe this is due to the article marketing business model he was looking at - here is what I mean.

I decided to go to Ezine and see who he was talking about. You can do the same if you want, I won't name him. I did this because with 24,000+ articles, I wanted to dig in to see what he was doing a bit more. i.e. niches, how many articles, how he set up his resource box, etc.

I ended up siging up for something he was giving away and got on his list, received a few emails on how to build a list, but also received some 'coaching session' recordings.

I got about half way through the second one, and the light bulb went on and I remembered TheenD's thread.

What this person is doing to earn income is Article Marketing, but he is not marketing a product, but rather a service, and it is IM Coaching.

1) Advertise someone else's solution to a problem
2) Get names to build your list
3) Build trust and confidence with the potential customers (don't try to sell yet)
4) Ask what problems you can solve for them (in that niche)
5) Create a product to sell to the customer.
6) Offer a coaching program for $2,000 - $5,000 (Having chosen a niche where coaching is appropriate.)

Get 2 - 1 students a week = $102,000 - $260,000 per year.

In the coaching mp3 I was listening to, which was just over 2 hours, he spent the first hour talking about why no other business model won't work. I think TheenD bought into this thinking, and some of it did make sense, but he had the audience believing that coaching in IM was the ONLY way to make big money.

This person uses article marketing to get names, build trust, and sell his product (coaching), and if my thinking is correct, he makes most likely between $500k and $1MM.

This is the highest margin product I have seen, and it also the highest priced type of product/service I have seen. (There could be other things, but I just don't know of them).

NOW:

I do believe that the thinking of TheenD was a bit naive to think that after just a few articles, he could sit back and let the paychecks roll in. He was also a bit naive to be convinced after such a short time that IM coaching was the only way to make money. Anything on the net takes a little time. Sure there are a few that hit it just right their first time, but I think they are the one-percenters.

The IM world is constantly changing. Someone who made $350k with Adsense five years ago, may not see that any more. Economies change, markets change, consumer thinking changes.

I would personally be happy with a steady stream of $20/day with Adsense. It would pay a few bills, and give the family an awesome vacation every year. Besides, once I figure out how to get to $20/day, I can figure out how to get to $200/day, or even $2,000/day.

I know people might flame me for this one, but after looking into the article marketing plan of the EZine author, I understand why he said what he did. I just wish he would have not looked at only one plan or method before making such a bold statement.

Scott