How do you fall in love with IM?

17 replies
I have a kind of stupid subject I want to mention, but it's a serious one.

I have recently started over at age 56 in Internet marketing and I can't complain about the progress I have made. I am not yet making great money, but I know it is coming.

I have learned how to choose markets where there is a lot of demand and enthusiastic (if not desperate) buyers, how to choose high-paying affiliate products to fill that demand (including product launches), how to set up websites (hosted and on my hosting account), how to do onsite SEO and offsite SEO (I have over 80 high ranking Web 2.0 accounts for backlinks in addition to blog marketing), how to write copy with psychological triggers, how to cloak affiliate links, how to do article marketing, how to do forum marketing, how to offer freebies, how to use Aweber, how to make and promote videos and audio, and on and on and on.

Here is my problem.

I don't love doing it.

I don't love doing backlinks and stuff like that. I get distracted easily because I love learning. I even love learning all that stuff. I also love people. The Intenet is an enormous intellectual banquet for a person of my temperament.

But how can you fall in love with the everyday mechanics of moneymaking? I look inside my heart and there is a bland bleh, not passion.

If it were a woman, I would have to say she is a wonderful companion, but I am always cheating on her and I want to feel differently about her. I don't want to cheat on her. But when I catch myself, I always find I am already in the middle of something else with another. Even this post is an example. (I sat down to be moneymaking with her, not be here talking about this.)

If I can learn to love her more, I know I will be hugely successful instead of moderately so.

Whaddya do in my shoes?

Can you learn how to fall in love with something like this?

Am I doomed to have a wandering vagabond heart?

Michael
#attitude #internet marketing #internet mechanics #money making #passion
  • Profile picture of the author imb
    I admit that when I'm in the middle of something I tend to get bored. But then I know that "this is it" no other way but this. I would rather do IM, than work for someone else. I make myself addicted to this business. And the WF is my drug.
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    • Profile picture of the author igorkheifets
      There are always boring aspect in every single kind of job or activity.

      And I bet you are not the only one who feels that way, I personally can't stand all that http and techniqal stuff, but there's always videos and articles and people to meet.

      I guess what you can do, is to hire some one else to do the "boring" stuff for you, but other than that...is it Really THAT bad?
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      • Profile picture of the author Zachary Goh
        I agree with Igor... Outsource is your answer.
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          • Profile picture of the author Jillian Slack
            Outsource it if you truly dislike that aspect. Plus it will free up your time to focus on the aspects of it you do enjoy (or could learn to enjoy).

            If I start to feel bogged down by something, I remind myself how much I hated my last 8-to-5 job.

            Focus on the parts of the biz that you DO enjoy. Or if you haven't found those areas yet, it's time to outsource whatever you can while you explore to find the parts of it that will make you feel all giddy inside.
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            • Thanks for the answers folks.

              Now for the killer question. How do you fall in love with outsourcing? :-)

              Joking aside, IM is the absolute best market this side of the universe. I am excited to be in it and I want that excitement to permeate all aspects of it.

              It doesn't yet, but I'll get there.

              I'm having a Pai de Santo (Brazilian witch doctor) concoct a love potion out of chicken entrails, a goat's head, cachaça, Bahian cigar smoke, and blessed by the Seven Mountains. Maybe that'll work.

              Joking really aside this time, I am not happy with the idea of running from my own attitude. I am going to learn to like the parts I don't like. If I can teach myself to like broccoli, I can certainly teach myself to like backlinks and metatags.

              I just wish it were more sexy. (sigh...)

              Michael
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              Know thyself...
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              • Profile picture of the author colinredk
                I think the question is not of passion but of momentum. Going back to the wife analogy you mentioned earlier, you're afraid of being a vagabond heart because you're not in love. The cross-signal you also mentioned is that you like learning. I say this is a cross-signal or a case of mixed metaphors. Why don't we switch this around and look at it in another manner: look at it as if you're married to learning something new.

                I mean it. You are actually married to learning something new. Which is why you got excited in the first place. And which would explain why you're still in internet marketing. (You did mention you're not in it for the money.)

                The good news is that IM is full of new things. In fact, as long as Google and the other search engines keep tweaking their algorithms, there would be new technologies and approaches to IM. If Microhoo had pushed through, a lot of the SEO topics right now would be on how to take advantage of that development. What I mean to say is that in this industry, which is melting pot of IT, marketing, grunt work, writing and discussions, there's a lot to learn.

                If you look at it from that viewpoint, IM as a learning experience, then you'll really love it. With the money earned as just gravy.

                Good luck on your IM love life.
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                • Originally Posted by colinredk View Post

                  (You did mention you're not in it for the money.)
                  C,

                  Of course I'm in it for the money!

                  I just don't like what they call people who go about loving for money.

                  :-)

                  Thank you for your well wishes. I do admit, it has been one hell of a ride up to now.

                  Michael
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                  • Profile picture of the author Jeff Schuman
                    One thought is to fall in love with the idea of helping other people with the money that you make. Another thought might be in fall in love with helping other people make money.

                    I know I read one time that Willie Crawford said having a goal bigger than yourself is very motivational when it comes to building your Internet business. In his case I think he was building a home less shelter for victims after hurricane Katrina.

                    You may not enjoy the process of Internet marketing and making money, but the end result could make it worthwhile.
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                    • Jeff,

                      I have had a good life, full of ups and downs. Music, motion pictures, translating, and some really offbeat things like Brazilian government bonds. (It gets weirder...)

                      In everything I touched, I have felt a fascination almost like a child in a candyshop. I guess I am spoiled. I'm a high-on-life junkie. I want that feeling with IM. Actually I do get it with many aspects of IM.

                      One particular thing that has fascinated me is the idea of copy. You can't use something on the Internet without copying it. That is inherent in the medium and this has played havock with copyright law. I watched a few videos by Lawrence Lessig and this really got my mind to spinning.

                      So a good approach, for me at least, is to try to repackage endlessly copied knowledge, with charm of course, to help create and spread wealth—and become endlessly copied myself.

                      (scratching head)

                      There might be some kind of metaphysical implication in there somewhere...

                      Anyway, you are absolutely correct about having an outreach goal. It is a wonderful motivator.

                      Michael
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                      • I think I am have been encountering a good solution: banter with IM people on WF!

                        (Discussing serious stuff, too, of course.)

                        Seriously. It helps.

                        Maybe working in isolation for too long has been getting me down.

                        There is another thing that is really messing with my head, but I am beginning to feel the indifference crack. I am working my way through a wonderful little book called: Self-Discipline in 10 Days--How to go from Thinking to Doing by Theodore Bryant.

                        This dude cuts deep into why and how we sabotage our own plans. He covers some basic fears we all have (failure, success, rejection, mediocrity and risk). He also mentions a thing called self-talk, which is what we say to ourselves nonstop, even when we are not aware of it (sort of like background music in a department store). Then he says we all have a Hyde within us (as in Jekyll and Hyde) that does not want to be disciplined. Hyde thinks we will lose our freedom and become an unhappy slave if we set a schedule. Hyde thinks some other funky stuff, too.

                        Hyde talks nonstop down on the self-talk level and if we do not talk back to him, he will have his way. He's the reason we do things we had no intention of doing and don't do things we want to.

                        The book basically is a method of taking apart Hyde's arguments and learning how to talk to him. You can't get rid of him, so Bryant teaches you how to recruit him to improve your self-discipline.

                        I'm on day four in this thing, doing it right with all exercises and schedules, and I can perceive an enormous positive increase in my attitude in relation to before. I am starting to do my tasks because I want to, not because I push myself (like I normally do).

                        I have high hopes this method is going to finish the way it has been going and I am going to turn into a marketing fiend (to use Armand Morin's term). If that is the case, I found gold, at least for my life.

                        (No, I am not an affiliate. At least not yet. If this thing works the way it has been doing so far, I am going to get in touch with this guy and sell this thing to Kingdom come.)

                        This guy Bryant may even be my IM Cupid.

                        Michael
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                        Know thyself...
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                      • Profile picture of the author colinredk
                        Speaking of meta-physics. Maybe you can tie up your IM work with some other passion that you have. It's not original, of course. A lot of people go into IM with something that they like to do, maybe a hobby, or a vocation. Others go into IM bringing with them their expertise. I guess if you like to something, and then use IM as a tool, then you wouldn't have to worry about loving IM. You'd look at it as a necessity in order to do something you really like doing. I hope I made sense here.
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                        • Profile picture of the author Reeveso
                          I would say 2 things...

                          First - like many others said, you should outsource anything you don't love doing if you have the money to do it (even if you're spending all your profits on it - that way you can focus on what you love)

                          Second - just started daydreaming about what IM is going to bring you.

                          More time with your wife/family/friends/,etc.

                          Whatever's important to you - IM'ing will bring you closer to that. Just keep that in the back of your mind when the times get tough and you want to quit.
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  • Profile picture of the author Robert_Rand
    It's about finding a match between activities you enjoy that are also highly leveraged.

    For example, you don't enjoy building backlinks and it's not a highly leveraged activity.

    Personally, I enjoy coming up with the idea for websites (not building them), writing copy and making money. So that's what I do: create landing pages and drive traffic to them.

    Simple, easy and fun.

    I also think that anyone who is trying to chase "free traffic" in exchange for their time is bound to encounter the exact sentiments you describe.
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