Free crash courses into sales funnels, banner marketing, and all things "lead generation"

The reason people pay for this information is because there are those who are experienced in doing these things who compile what works for them.

By asking here for recommendations - all you're doing is spreading the conflicts from what you see, to what everyone who replies sees.

Online marketing methods are worth money, because they can earn you money... so the most comprehensive courses will cost money.

'Free' means an investment of your time to learn what you can find out for free, and implement them to see what works. 'Paid' means that everything that works for one person is handed to you.

I won't offer suggestions on free sources of marketing, because I'd only be adding to the confusion.

Wow... I must say I'm disappointed. I don't think I've ever seen a forum this closed to new people.
Yes, I'm aware of the search feature. I've already used it. Hence the comment about: "there are so many strategies and conflicting views it's hard to sift through the murk."
It doesn't take much, nor does it "gip" anyone to say: "I found that _____ was very informative for me and I learned a lot from his course."
Yes, there's a lot that you can purchase, but there's a lot of information that's free as well.
There's a lot of confusion on who's reputable in internet marketing and who isn't. Plenty of people sell "marketing secrets" but are just in fact spreading someone else's marketing strategy. My hope was to bypass the fluff and BS and get recommendations from experienced individuals on who's real, who's not, and what my best resources are.
The last thing I expected was to be attacked an belittled for asking for suggestions. This really came as a huge surprise to me.
If anyone else out there isn't offended by my asking who helped you get to where you are, I'd love to hear your suggestions. Or, if you know of some great free resources to help as well, that would be awesome.
Thanks again in advance,
JRadTheBad

JRad -

Look, you've made two posts and you want someone
to do your work for you.

"Show me all the free resources on these five subjects
so I can become an expert."

Why not post a link so we can send money into your
PayPal account and save a few steps?

You're asking some high level questions that would
require someone else's VALUABLE time to answer.

You will become an expert one of two ways -

1. You will put in the time, trying what you've learned so
far, working your way through the muck.

2. You will pay someone because they've already spent
the time trying it all and sharing what they've found to
work. You still have to do the work but their knowledge
is a shortcut.

If you're not willing to invest in one way or the other, then
"expert" is a pipe-dream.

Sorry - it's the truth you need to hear. Because while
people rave about the free information available here, or
there, or wherever, you're not going to get something
valuable for nothing.

All the best to you - X

We are not closed to new people.

We do get sick of people expecting us to teach them what took years and often a sizable cash outlay to learn...people BTW who often don't even bother with a "thank you."

"Free," is a myth. Hire a coach or be a whole lot more respectful of the people who posses the information you seek.

I'm asking someone to do my work for me? I'm stunned at the rudeness of these responses! I'm asking for people with experience to help point me in the right direction. For some reason you appear to be threatened by this. The elitist attitude I've encountered on my first post here doesn't leave me with high hopes. I certainly hope not everyone shares your attitude.

As far as my attitude is concerned, I can boil it down for you in a single acronym. P.h.d. Poor, hungry, determined. I'm confused as to why you're offended that I've sought advice from people who claim to be experienced individuals in online marketing. I'm not asking anyone to do my work for me. I'm asking for help in identifying the best resources I can turn to without spending money. I taught myself PHP, HTML, Java, and Objective-C entirely on free resources without anyone "doing the work for me".

How about we do this:
If you don't want to give any suggestions, awesome. That's your prerogative. But as the OP, I ask that you not bog down a reasonable thread with your attacks and criticism. Thank you.

@Steve B: I didn't realize this forum was a bucket full of crabs scrambling to be the guy on top. It was my understanding that this was an online internet marketing "community".

So asking for a direction to be pointed in is asking for "handouts"? This makes me laugh. Every single response I've gotten so far feels like the guy is "threatened". It takes far less time to say "I think _____ is a great guy with some awesome info that might help you with _____." than it does to articulate the bludgeoning criticisms of "How dare you try to take business away from me? I'll tell you only if you pay me. You only get information by paying people."

While you aren't one of the people in this thread doing this Steve, almost every other response has been more or less at that leve. I'm not stupid enough to fall for these lies. Yes, they are lies and the people saying it know that it's true. I've found more information online about every subject I asked for advice in than is possible for me to review in an entire lifetime. I was asking for advice on what people suggest rather than sort through it by hand.

If you want to be successful, ask for advice from successful people. I wouldn't dream of considering the attackers here as "marketing gurus" since they've lost sight of the most basic principle of sales and marketing: "People buy from people they like."
They aren't very likable people and seem convinced that bullying is the only way to achieve marketing dominance... I pity them.

It looks like this is a lost cause. I'm sure there are plenty of very, very awesome people here with great advice but by the looks of things, no one will part with any advice unless I provide some thing of value back or pay them in cash.

This isn't an internet marketing community. This is the Internet Marketing Blackmarket.

Cowboy walks into a bar. New boots, new
hat, new jeans (no shirt).

"Who's the baddest gunslinger in town?" says he.

"I want him to teach me how to kick all you alls
asses. And I ain't gonna pay him a cent 'cuz I
spent everything I got on these boots, jeans and
hat."

The drunks at the bar snicker.

The cowboy pulls out his gun, pop-pop-pop.

The smell of sulfer-caps fill the air.

"Ya'll are threatened by me, ain't ya. Well,
fine. I'll go learn how to kill ya'll someplace
else."

BWAHAHA

Lighten up JRad.

1. Curt Maly - Social Media Ad Genius

2. Check out a Brad Geddes book. ROI is directly correlated with the type of keywords you target. In other words, some traffic is FAR more valuable than other forms of traffic. Think quality, not quantity.

3. Split testing.

4. Information overload, wrong mindset, focus

5. Other businesses that do business with customers like yours'. Joint ventures.

These are really BIG questions and to be frank, not for one inexperienced person to do. You're talking about a 6-figure salary to fit that job description.

And . . . you should also be picking the brain of the veteran who's leaving, but he's probably already smelling the next pasture.

Hey X,
Lighten up. I'm not asking for your advice and if you can find one instance where I ever asked anyone on this forum to "teach me" I will post a video of me grovelling on my hands and knees for you.

You've constructed a fair strawman fallacy there sir. As the OP, I'd ask you to kindly file your "He refuses to pay me for my advice" complaints in my official "complaints receptacle". You'll find it under your kitchen sink with a plastic bag in it.

-EDIT- I just saw your new post. Thank your for the information. I'll be sure to look into this.

-- Facebook ads and marketing,.

You can do a lot worse than keep up to date with Ryan's stuff, he's all over this and gives a lot a way for free, just head over to his primary marketing blog and subscribe.

Blog | Digital Marketer

-- PPC/ guy for Adwords .

Probably it's still Perry - IMO, he has a very cheap course IIRC , if not head over his site, he gives a huge amount a away, sign up for his freebie.,

Google AdWords Advertising and How to Advertise on Google

-- Sales funnels, tough one.

There's a lot of decent stuff out there covering in depth every conceivable upsell / downsell/OTO/ follow up permutation combined with strategically timed exit offers, and automated timed email for cart abandonment etc, there's just to many facets of a sales funnel to name one guy. Actually the WF isn't a bad source but my advice is go to companies who are in your vertical who are successful and go through their cart process, it's amazing what you'll learn just by doing that.


-- Biggest hurdles to overcome in internet marketing in general

That's just too general really, but as I've been marketing online and generated millions of dollars for myself and others over the last 15 years, I can give you a few take homes on the obstacles most find.

Information overload - this is a huge problem, especially for newbies with so many shiny lights everywhere, My advice is set a goal, with a fixed deadline to become savvy in one element, for example funnel creation and focus all your energy and time into that until you get it "mastered". Extract the best tactics from the best marketers and forge a customer experience from that experience which suits your niche and demographic.

Expecting too much too soon.
This is another big one, far too many BS promises suggesting you can do xyz in 4 weeks, always accompanied by pictures of ferraris and crap. Sometimes, it's a grind to find the way forward, but it takes time, experience and mistakes to get to that goal , anybody who tells you otherwise normally has something to sell you .


--- Best ways to produce new leads to push into the funnel.

That question is awkward, there's no "best" way, it really depends on what resources you have, budget, timescales, etc. Generally speaking the tried and tested lead magnet in exchange for an optin is / has been / and probably always will be a winner. That said, there's a million ways to get to that end game.

PPC
Media buying CPM
Social media
syndication etc.
affiliates/partners.

There's at least a dozen primary methods and dozens more sub categories of those methods, I wouldn't say any was the "best" , it really depends on your skill sets.

I will say this however, once I stopped with free methods and just got to grips with paid traffic, and tracking/ tweaking to ensure a ROI from that spend, that's when things get interesting. There's so much traffic to be bought, if you can get your funnel right, and your follow up AR series right etc, there's really no limit to how many leads you can generate.

That's a brief synopsis, ultimately, it's hard to give you really straight answers, you're going to end up finding your path by just constantly studying , getting experience, making ****ups, making progress and constantly building on that progress .

Cheers.

Wow MC3,
Awesome information. That's may more detailed than I expected or hoped for.
You've given me a lot to sink my teeth into.
I've noticed that a lot of sites professing to be experts in online marketing give stuff for free. I'm assuming it's being used as a "trip wire" to try to get them to buy something down the road but it's good to see resources that offer info for free on a regular basis.
Thanks again man!