Why Is The Money Never In The List??

"Oh why, why is the money NEVER in the list no matter how hard I try?!"

The money is in the list, the money is in the list, the money is in the ___?

If you've been around the online sphere of marketing for a long time, you're going to hear these phrases - heck, you might even completely believe it in your heart. But hear me out...


If $$$ was in the list, anyone could go out from a random list vendor or email seller, and then whip up an email offer, and become a millionaire overnight.

If $$$ was in the list, you could build a random list of prospects and then repetitively pump them with "ad swaps" and then profit in the LONG-run.

If $$$ was in the list, you could just trick targeted people into a list with indirect techniques and expect to profit from them.

The problem with this advice is not that it is completely wrong. The problem is that most people take it literally.

It's not the SIZE of the list, but your RELATIONSHIP with these people. It's all about the VALUE you provide to people!

You see, value is a very subjective thing. It can mean a lot of things, such as...

• Promoting a product that is of very high quality
• Lowering the "free line": Giving out nuggets of wisdom for free
• Letting people experience results even before they purchase any products from you

Let's face it: Many "marketers" become more and more desensitized as they hide behind their computers.

In a recent book, there has been a term coined as "growth hacker", a person who looks at metrics and conversion rates and mathematically promotes growth.

There's nothing wrong with tracking your business. It should be done, but it should never be the BASIS of your marketing. Tracking and tweaking is like a journalistic record of whatever you have done and tried. Whatever test is statistically significant will be your current "control", and you'll come up with more and more ways and ideas to beat that control.

What I'm saying is, marketing should also come from the heart.

I like to think of it this way: Your income is directly proportional to the amount of value that you are able to effectively deliver to your market. The more value you are able to provide, the more money you make!

EVERY single being on your list is a human being.

They aren't bots or computers without a brain or heart. They're holding in dreams, frustrations, hopes and fears. Learn how to empathize with these people, and your business will run forever.

Every single message that you send out should communicate that empathy.

While "blasting" your list with random offers might work in the short-run, eventually, these prospects get tired out - and they'd rarely refer other people onto your list. That's one viral strategy down.

Some might argue that there is the "moving parade" - where new crowds of people will continuously join your list, and you'll just continue to promote to this new segment. And I personally think that you've got it topsy-turvy.

You want to get your new segments to YOUR offers - so that you can lock them in your front-end product buyer's list, and then upsell them on the backend. If they do not buy, continuously, it's obvious that they are not interested in your solutions, and you are free to send related offers, or construct a different front-end.

So next time you look at your email list, don't look at them as pure numbers and potential profit.

Create a "customer avatar" - a representative of the commonalities found in most of your customers. What they like, what they know and what they trust. Their hopes, dreams, fears. Boil them all to one person, and talk to just that one person.

Hope warriors can chip in on this.

Best wishes,
James Fame

P.S. The money is in the VALUE you provide to a list!