The Naked Truth About Giving Back... (a guided lesson)
Sup Warriors?
How's your day going?
Thought I would share some positive experiences with you today, as well as some lessons learned.
I'm hoping to:
First, the background.
A little less than a month ago, I did a little giveaway in celebration of my 500th post.
In case you want to see it, here's the thread:
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...hips-more.html
As of this writing, the thread has 190 responses and 3,589 views. (Now on page 52 - man, there's a lot of posts here!)
Now, I went, shall we say, a bit over the top with my giveaways, really trying to put some stuff out there that would help fellow Warriors.
The response from other Warriors was amazing. SEVERAL others jumped in and contributed THEIR OWN gifts to MY giveaway, allowing me to extend that help even further.
So what does this have to do with making money?
I thought you would never ask. ;-)
My intentions were true all along. Know that. We ARE marketers though, right?
I wanted to find out what people would actually USE if I did a giveaway.
So, what did I do? I did some MARKET RESEARCH.
My thread "What would help YOU most - if it were free?"
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...were-free.html
Received 79 responses and 929 views.
I simply asked people what they wanted, and amazingly enough, they TOLD me.
Market Research, check. I then knew there was a hungry market for certain things (War Room Membership, WSO Sponsorship, etc).
Now, you can argue that OF COURSE people want those things, but I also got valuable feedback for other ideas... (are you taking notes here? This is your list of ideas for your next WSO!)
Here's a few things people SPECIFICALLY asked for.
People ready to read your posts and pay you money today...
BTW - if you can create those gold bars, let me know - I'm in on your WSO!
I took those ideas and ran with them, adding some of my own twists when I did my give away.
So how did it work? Well, like I said, the 500th post thread has 190 responses and 3,589 views.
So what, right?
Here's what.
In addition to the other items in the giveaway, I let anyone that wanted them have unrestricted PLR to some video squeeze pages I created.
To date, they have been downloaded more than 300 times (haven't checked in a while).
Being a marketer, I ALSO put an option (not required) to opt-in to my list. If they did, I gave them a few more of the video squeeze pages.
It's not killing it, but I added 100+ subscribers to my list in about 2 weeks, and still get a trickle coming in. Makes me grin every time I see the new subscriber notice... easy - BUT YOU GOTTA THINK ABOUT IT, and plan for it.
All I did was split up the pack of squeeze pages, offered the freebies, and also the option to get more in exchange for their email.
OK, so I added some subscribers. Anything else?
Yep.
Because I was (IMHO) truly giving back, I received tons of posts and PM's full of praise and good will. It caught the attention of members with thousands of posts all the way down to one post.
Does that really matter? No, I suppose not. But it's nice to have stronger friendships with so many people.
Comments like these sure make you feel good:
(I'm leaving out the authors, but if you really want to know you can search the thread)
"Gary, I'm speechless. Um....thanks? :-)"
"Gary, I've always enjoyed your posts here but now you've officially made it to my list of favorite warriors. :-)
WHAT a giveaway, I mean totally blew me away."
"It's great that you are giving away so much for your 500th post (it tells me you really "get it"). However, I would like to point something out, if I may. You have already given a lot away, IMHO, in the form of your contributions to the Warrior Forum.
So, I would like to add a big THANK YOU on top of the congratulations."
"Woah man, this is more than generous of you and seldom heard of to go so over the top with value. I applaud you, my friend.."
"Very generous, Gary. I salute you...and congrats on the milestone."
You get the point.
Anything else?
Sure... I've made some solid connections with the prize winners and several other Warriors - everything from WSO reviews to input on sales letters, JV discussions and just plain old shooting the breeze.
Most importantly, with the help of SEVERAL other warriors that jumped in and donated their own gifts, I was able to help many others than I hoped originally... sponsor them, provide graphics, pay for their WSO, do brainstorming with them, product critiques, etc. Stuff they NEEDED.
I'm not patting myself on the back here, but when you help, it sure makes you feel good.
But what did I do wrong?
(always important to reflect and adapt, right?)
First, near the end of the "active" time for the thread (last prize announcements, etc.) I unintentionally was posting replies one at a time vs replying to multiple people in the same post. (sorry mods - not intentional)
I had one of my posts deleted (rightfully so) as this was most likely taken as just bumping post count. That wasn't my intention, but it's easily understood how it could be taken that way (and, it's just not a good way to participate - be brief and to the point).
The last thing I (or hopefully you) should want to do is give the mods more work than they already have.
I blew it on my autoresponder too. When people went to download my squeeze pages and decided to opt-in to get more, I had a whole autoresponder series setup to connect with and market to them. I jacked up the send dates, and it was several days later before I realized it - IMHO too late to re-start the series.
My confirmation page for my autoresponder was a generic one. I should have used a custom return page with an upsell for a related product. Duh.
Think THROUGH stuff... it's these little details that SCALE stuff so you can either START making something or make MORE of it.
Perhaps the biggest "mistake" I made was underestimating the TIME required.
I had some folks warn me (thanks Pete) but I got on a roll and still got sidetracked.
While the thread was hot and I was trying to sort through all the submissions to make selections, I realized that I was actually DOING brainstorming/coaching/mastermind sessions/product reviews with people as the posts and PM's came in - And I hadn't even awarded a prize yet!
I'll carry the total number of these freebies I did to my grave, but I'll do so with a smile, knowing that I got to help those people too, even though their name wasn't in lights on the thread as a selected recipient.
It certainly was a major challenge trying to choose only a small number of recipients for these gifts. There were so many people that "spoke" to me, it was not easy deciding who benefited and who had to wait for the next go-around.
Was it worth it?
Ab-so-freakin-lootly.
So many people here have helped, reached out just because and been there to answer questions, give advice or just listen.
Hopefully this gives you some food for thought, educates or just motivates you to DO something and see how it goes. If no one had posted and I gained zero subscribers, I still would have picked some deserving Warriors and donated the prizes.
Why? Because they needed it.
If you're bouncing from one idea to the next, focus and move forward. If you can't, seek help from someone that posts frequently about that topic or grab a coach/mentor (offer to work off your fees if you can't pay).
It's been said countless times before, but this is a community. We're gonna have our troubles. We're gonna have our jerks. But we're also gonna have good friends and trusted business partners.
I'll be in that corner. See ya there.
- Gary
How's your day going?
Thought I would share some positive experiences with you today, as well as some lessons learned.
I'm hoping to:
a) Educate some
b) Encourage all
c) Get your creative juices flowing to help you build your business and find little ways to scale things up easily
First, the background.
A little less than a month ago, I did a little giveaway in celebration of my 500th post.
In case you want to see it, here's the thread:
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...hips-more.html
As of this writing, the thread has 190 responses and 3,589 views. (Now on page 52 - man, there's a lot of posts here!)
Now, I went, shall we say, a bit over the top with my giveaways, really trying to put some stuff out there that would help fellow Warriors.
The response from other Warriors was amazing. SEVERAL others jumped in and contributed THEIR OWN gifts to MY giveaway, allowing me to extend that help even further.
So what does this have to do with making money?
I thought you would never ask. ;-)
My intentions were true all along. Know that. We ARE marketers though, right?
I wanted to find out what people would actually USE if I did a giveaway.
So, what did I do? I did some MARKET RESEARCH.
My thread "What would help YOU most - if it were free?"
http://www.warriorforum.com/main-int...were-free.html
Received 79 responses and 929 views.
I simply asked people what they wanted, and amazingly enough, they TOLD me.
Market Research, check. I then knew there was a hungry market for certain things (War Room Membership, WSO Sponsorship, etc).
Now, you can argue that OF COURSE people want those things, but I also got valuable feedback for other ideas... (are you taking notes here? This is your list of ideas for your next WSO!)
Here's a few things people SPECIFICALLY asked for.
People ready to read your posts and pay you money today...
- War Room Sponsorship
- WSO Sponsorship/Bump
- Classified Ad Sponsorship/Bump
- Mentoring/Coaching/Mastermind Sessions (at all levels)
- Video creation
- Niche Research
- PPC info
- Articles
- Graphics
- WSO Review (someone getting ready to launch and you review and give input, not just a thread post)
- Traffic Generation
- (my favorite - 50lb Gold Bar)
BTW - if you can create those gold bars, let me know - I'm in on your WSO!
I took those ideas and ran with them, adding some of my own twists when I did my give away.
So how did it work? Well, like I said, the 500th post thread has 190 responses and 3,589 views.
So what, right?
Here's what.
In addition to the other items in the giveaway, I let anyone that wanted them have unrestricted PLR to some video squeeze pages I created.
To date, they have been downloaded more than 300 times (haven't checked in a while).
Being a marketer, I ALSO put an option (not required) to opt-in to my list. If they did, I gave them a few more of the video squeeze pages.
It's not killing it, but I added 100+ subscribers to my list in about 2 weeks, and still get a trickle coming in. Makes me grin every time I see the new subscriber notice... easy - BUT YOU GOTTA THINK ABOUT IT, and plan for it.
All I did was split up the pack of squeeze pages, offered the freebies, and also the option to get more in exchange for their email.
OK, so I added some subscribers. Anything else?
Yep.
Because I was (IMHO) truly giving back, I received tons of posts and PM's full of praise and good will. It caught the attention of members with thousands of posts all the way down to one post.
Does that really matter? No, I suppose not. But it's nice to have stronger friendships with so many people.
Comments like these sure make you feel good:
(I'm leaving out the authors, but if you really want to know you can search the thread)
"Gary, I'm speechless. Um....thanks? :-)"
"Gary, I've always enjoyed your posts here but now you've officially made it to my list of favorite warriors. :-)
WHAT a giveaway, I mean totally blew me away."
"It's great that you are giving away so much for your 500th post (it tells me you really "get it"). However, I would like to point something out, if I may. You have already given a lot away, IMHO, in the form of your contributions to the Warrior Forum.
So, I would like to add a big THANK YOU on top of the congratulations."
"Woah man, this is more than generous of you and seldom heard of to go so over the top with value. I applaud you, my friend.."
"Very generous, Gary. I salute you...and congrats on the milestone."
You get the point.
Anything else?
Sure... I've made some solid connections with the prize winners and several other Warriors - everything from WSO reviews to input on sales letters, JV discussions and just plain old shooting the breeze.
Most importantly, with the help of SEVERAL other warriors that jumped in and donated their own gifts, I was able to help many others than I hoped originally... sponsor them, provide graphics, pay for their WSO, do brainstorming with them, product critiques, etc. Stuff they NEEDED.
I'm not patting myself on the back here, but when you help, it sure makes you feel good.
But what did I do wrong?
(always important to reflect and adapt, right?)
First, near the end of the "active" time for the thread (last prize announcements, etc.) I unintentionally was posting replies one at a time vs replying to multiple people in the same post. (sorry mods - not intentional)
I had one of my posts deleted (rightfully so) as this was most likely taken as just bumping post count. That wasn't my intention, but it's easily understood how it could be taken that way (and, it's just not a good way to participate - be brief and to the point).
The last thing I (or hopefully you) should want to do is give the mods more work than they already have.
I blew it on my autoresponder too. When people went to download my squeeze pages and decided to opt-in to get more, I had a whole autoresponder series setup to connect with and market to them. I jacked up the send dates, and it was several days later before I realized it - IMHO too late to re-start the series.
My confirmation page for my autoresponder was a generic one. I should have used a custom return page with an upsell for a related product. Duh.
Think THROUGH stuff... it's these little details that SCALE stuff so you can either START making something or make MORE of it.
Perhaps the biggest "mistake" I made was underestimating the TIME required.
I had some folks warn me (thanks Pete) but I got on a roll and still got sidetracked.
While the thread was hot and I was trying to sort through all the submissions to make selections, I realized that I was actually DOING brainstorming/coaching/mastermind sessions/product reviews with people as the posts and PM's came in - And I hadn't even awarded a prize yet!
I'll carry the total number of these freebies I did to my grave, but I'll do so with a smile, knowing that I got to help those people too, even though their name wasn't in lights on the thread as a selected recipient.
It certainly was a major challenge trying to choose only a small number of recipients for these gifts. There were so many people that "spoke" to me, it was not easy deciding who benefited and who had to wait for the next go-around.
Was it worth it?
Ab-so-freakin-lootly.
So many people here have helped, reached out just because and been there to answer questions, give advice or just listen.
Hopefully this gives you some food for thought, educates or just motivates you to DO something and see how it goes. If no one had posted and I gained zero subscribers, I still would have picked some deserving Warriors and donated the prizes.
Why? Because they needed it.
- Help those that you can.
- Kick those in the butt that need it.
- Build a better relationship with someone today, right now.
- Remember, you can hone your skills even when doing the right thing
If you're bouncing from one idea to the next, focus and move forward. If you can't, seek help from someone that posts frequently about that topic or grab a coach/mentor (offer to work off your fees if you can't pay).
It's been said countless times before, but this is a community. We're gonna have our troubles. We're gonna have our jerks. But we're also gonna have good friends and trusted business partners.
I'll be in that corner. See ya there.
- Gary
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