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The Absolutely, Completely Stupid Way To Making Hundreds Of Sales
By admin | March 28, 2010
Both the turtles and I like and follow Marlon Sanders. When he wrote yesterday about “The Absolutely, Completely Stupid Way To Making Hundreds Of Sales” the term Stupid caught our attention. After all the turtles have never been accused of being smart, sly at times but very qualified fore anything that is stupid.
The Absolutely, Completely Stupid Way To Making Hundreds Of Sales
What I have to say today is stupid.
Really, really stupid.
Yet it could make you hundreds of sales just as soon as you apply it.
I’ll also reveal how just a sales letter that is only HALF complete and totally misses the point can actually make sales.
Last summer in my city of San Antonio, Texas, we had a drought.
It was pretty bad.
You could only water using a sprinkler for 2 hours a week during an assigned time. My time was 8 p.m to 10 p.m. on a Friday night.
Like I was going to stay home every Friday night to water. Please!
So anyway, THIS summer I have hades to pay.
My back yard resembles a jungle.
Now, in the front yard I paid someone to hand remove the weeds.
And I hand pulled them out myself also.
And I STILL got weeds. Before you laugh at my pain and mysery, I want to show you how you can do something better.
You can make sales from my pain, your pain and the pains other people have.
I know you may think because some people call me a marketing wizard, I should also be good at lawn care. And yeah, I know you think I got the world’s best landscaper.
Which only shows how much you don’t understand about this topic.
See, sometimes you only understand a pain by having the pain or talking to someone else about it. And how YOU understand it isn’t how THEY understand it.
Go on Craigs List. LOOK to see if anyone has an ad that says “I’ll blast your WEEDS to a place the sun don’t shine and keep them permanently banned there until the battle of Armaggeddon.
Bet you don’t see that ad.
Now, I can have my yard LANDSCAPED.
I don’t NEED landscaping! I got WEEDS. I got PAIN.
See? I don’t need landscaping. I don’t WANT landscaping. I want to blast these weeds to a place where the sun don’t shine for like a L-O-N-G, L-O-N-G time!
Now, in making this embarrassing confession, I’m quite aware some other Internet marketer will try to score points by showing their carefully manicured yard and pointing out they pay THEIR landscaper 100 g’s a year — or whatever.
One upmanship in this business is a way of life. I’m a marketer, not a gardener. Trust me on this one.
That’s got NOTHING to do with the point of this article. And really, I don’t need you to post all your weed getting rid of tips on my blog.
Seriously. This article is NOT about weeds.
It’s about PAIN and understanding what hot buttons REALLY are and how stupid marketers are and how to make hundreds of sales by being really STUPID.
… Stupid enough to find out what the REAL PAIN is and sell a solution to IT instead of what you THINK the solution should be.
Which is something I always think about in my business. Am I missing YOUR PAIN?
See, to me, you find a problem that’s a good topic for an info product and in a target group of people where they also spend money on a repeat basis and for larger items.
Then you create and sell the front-end product (the initial sale for those of you who stupidly haven’t read Amazing Formula).
Then you make the back end sales.
Did you know 324 people a day search for: “how to kills weeds” on yahoo, Google and msn? (according to Traffic Travis)
173 a day search for “how to get rid of weeds”
That’s 500 people a day searching, not including the traffic you could get on the content network and via banner advertising like Joel showed you how to do on the webinar I sponsored with him.
That’s roughly 15,000 searches a month.
Anyway, I’m off the topic….
See, hop on over to clickbank.com.
Type in WEEDS. Or “Get Rid of Weeds”.
Here is the #1 relevant result I get:
“The Secret of A Great Lawn Without Needing a Professional ñ You Can Do It And I Can Show You How!”
A Great Looking Lawn Doesn’t Have To Cost Hundreds Of Dollars Or Require The Use Of A Professional Lawn Care Service. All You Need Is This Incredible Book!
Now, that’s a beautiful web site and I’m certain it’s an awesome ebook.
But a beautiful lawn is a LONG WAY away from my mind.
I got WEEDS.
Do you get it?
I don’t want a freaking ebook about a beautiful lawn. I want to get rid of these weeds.
Now, I went down to my home depot and asked them.
Actually, I had to search about 10 minutes before I could even find anyone to talk to.
THEN the guy I talked to was apparently a contractor caring for their plants. And he didn’t “supposed” to talk to me.
But he said I probably had Bermuda and I needed XZY product.
So I tried a little test patch.
KILLED MY GRASS!
Now, not only do I got weeds. I got dead grass.
Come to find out, if you put the wrong stuff on there you kill your grass.
Now I know someone is sayin’ “How come you just don’t hire someone?”
I DID.
I had a guy come out. Gave me a very professional analysis. Said he’d give me a quote. NEVER got back to me and I can’t find his card.
Had someone else call me. I called them back and didn’t even get a voice mail.
Fortunately, over SUSHI last night, I met a GUY at the sushi bar who told me HOW TO get rid of these blasted weeds.
So guys and gals, you can relax. My lawn is SAVED.
But I DID find an ebook on Clickbank I might order:
I won’t give you the link because the sales letter is HALF FINISHED! Seriously. The letter is only half finished.
But he has a 4-day lawn turnaround.
I figure my lawn could use THAT!
Now, if the sales letter is only half finished, I figure the ebook probably is too. So maybe I won’t buy it.
But even HIS sales letter doesn’t talk about my problem….
WEEDS!
Here’s the point:
==============================
Do Your Customers Have WEEDS?
==============================See, if YOUR customers have weeds, and you’re talking to them about beautiful lawns, they probably feel like cussing you out.
There are TWO MOTIVATORS:
1. The desire for pleasure, i.e. get a beautiful lawn
2. The desire to get rid of pain, i.e. get rid of weeds
If you’re talking about one and your customers have another, it’s a problem.
How to make STUPID money
Did you know you can actually make sales by being stupid? That’s right. Stupid enough to not listen to your own advice and your own ideas.
And stupid enough to listen to the pain of your customers or potential customers.
If you THINK the lesson of today’s article is that you should go write an ebook about weeds, you really and truly haven’t heard a thing I’ve said.
It’s NOT about weeds. Weeds have nothing to do with it.
It’s about what goes on inside of people’s heads and what motivates them to take action.
You know, you’d THINK some of these stupid “lawn mowing” services would pass out fliers on houses with weeds that say:
“Get rid of your weeds in 6 weeks — guaranteed.”
But they don’t.
They mail you fliers for lawn mowing.
Anyone can mow a lawn.
If I wanted business, what I’d do is send out fliers that said,
“I’ll banish your weeds to a place where the sun don’t shine and they’ll NEVER come back again or you don’t pay me”
Dear Neighbor,
I freaking hate weeds.
Can’t stand the sob’s.
I supposed I have a psychological hang up. It gives me great pleasure to kill the suckers and banish them to a place where the sun don’t shine.
I don’t know what a psychologist would say about that.
But if you have weeds, I’ll guarantee you one thing. I’ll get rid of those nasty suckers and they won’t EVER bother you again.
Here’s the story:
…. then I’d tell a story and go into benefits about how easy it was and all that. If you don’t know how to write benefits then you need to read Amazing Formula again and re-listen to the audio that comes with Push Button Letters and re-read Ockham’s Razor.
Anyway, do you see how you could run a 20 or 30 person business and probably do a million dollars a year in weed prevention services by being STUPID and understanding the PAIN people have?
See, no one wants to get rid of weeds? It doesn’t impress their relatives to say they get rid of weeds.
“Oh, I’m a landscape manicurist and I create beautiful lawns.” Now THAT s what everyone wants to be. That sounds all impressive and stuff.
But STUPID thinking is just “what’s the pain and how do I get RID of it and banish it to a place where they ain’t ever gonna be no sun.”
So the question is, do YOUR customers have weeds?
Are their “weeds” addressed by existing info products?
I know this is a stupid article.
It’s about a trivial problem I have … weeds in my yard.
Fortunately, all is well because I had sushi last night and the dude there told me how to get rid of ‘em. He has a little secret none of his OTHER neighbors know.
And his yard always looks great year around and is greener faster than anyone else’s. How cool is that?
Now, in Internet marketing, there are lots of pains. I’ve built my solutions around getting rid of these pains:
1. The pain of creating an info product
http://www.productdashboard.com
2. The pain of designing a web site and not knowing how to do it
http://www.designdashboard.com
3. The pain of getting people to buy
http://www.pushbuttonletters.com
4. The pain of getting traffic
http://www.affiliatedashboard.com
(although the traffic issue is one I’m still working on for a more elegant solution).
5. The pain of overshelm
6. The pain of sporadic income
http://www.thewritersecret.com
7. The pain of getting new customers and making sales
8. The pain of not seeing the big picture
But maybe you got “weeds” and I have missed YOUR PAIN.
If I have, then tell me.
http://www.marlonsnews.com/what-is-your-pain/
=======================================================
Marlon Sanders helps people with hopes and dreams figure out how to turn those into reality by selling stuff on the Internet.
The Writers Secret
Guess it is a good time for us all to get stupid.
Disclaimer: Some of the links mentioned within this post or posts it may lead to are my affiliate links and in such case I will get compensated for recommending those products. However, I will never recommend something that I don’t personally believe in and I welcome your questions and feedback.
Topics: lessons | 4 Comments »
March 28th, 2010 at 11:39 am
That was a very fun and entertaining article with a message that should be loud and clear to all. I understand and now need to learn to take action and put into practice what you have taught. Thank you O Wise One.
.-= Andre Arnett´s last blog ..Avoid The Scams In Affiliate Marketing =-.
March 28th, 2010 at 1:40 pm
Brilliant article from a marketing point of view, but now that it’s going to attract 500 searchers a day looking to kill weeds, is Marlon going to create that product to ease their pain using the secret his neighbor offered him?
.-= Doug Champigny´s last blog ..Tweet Traffic Rush Video Tour and Explanation =-.
April 18th, 2010 at 2:18 pm
Amazing article… Marlon never fails to deliver great content. Thanks for posting it Mike!
.-= Joel Osborne´s last blog ..Affiliate Marketing Webinar =-.