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

http://www.overwhelmcure.com

6. The pain of sporadic income

http://www.thewritersecret.com

7. The pain of getting new customers and making sales

http://www.promodashboard.com

8. The pain of not seeing the big picture

http://www.amazingformula.com

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.

Technorati Tags: eliminate pain, Marlon Sanders, understanding your customer

Unlike me the turtles have become quite lazy except when they are begging for food.

With the snow this past week or so I have not made it out to the pet store so they have been stuck with the stick food and have not had any fish for a bit.

When they complained about it I told them they have not been doing there part in keeping the blog up to date. So I told them “no income from content no goodies for the turtles”. That got their attention.

After some discussion (yes I know I am nuts and talk to turtles) they asked what I was reading when I was scribbling furiously last week?

When I said it was The Writers Secret from Marlon Sanders (the turtles like Marlon by the way because his products always give me a good return on investment which leads to more fish for turtles) the next question was why so many notes?

Because as I read through it I kept finding little tweaks that would improve what I was doing. The one little idea increased my normal conversion rate on a product and I will be adding some of these tweaks to all of my products.

Now for a new person this will save them time because instead of struggling like I did they can add these in from the beginning. The one test I did showed how much money I have left on the table because I did not do that tweak.

As always Marlon over delivered on this one and I don’t know but I expect the price will be increasing as the value is there to support it.

Check out The Writers Secret today. The turtles approve it. Now off to the pet store here.

Oh and the title of the post comes just because I have been reading Anne Rice’s “Interview With A Vampire” and I liked the idea

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: increase conversion, marketing, Marlon Sanders, The Writers Secret

Regular readers know that the Turtles are big fans of Marlon Sanders. With permission here is his latest newsletter that can really help you.

7 Steps to a Spectacular 2010 — My Own Personal Checklist You Can Steal

By Marlon Sanders

Ready or not, 2010 is here.

I want to lay out a checklist you can take to make 2010 a great one.

1. Focus 80% of your time, energy and efforts on getting new customers.

The hardest thing you have to do in business is to get a new customer. This should be the focus of your mental energy and time.

Without a non-stop supply of new customers, you’ll not have the year you want.

In my business, I’m renewing my commitment to my affiliates. And also trying a few new methods.

Focus on getting new customers. Then focus on it some more. Now go get some more. Keep ‘em pouring into your funnel.

2. As a corollary to that, make sure you have all your ducks in a row in whatever method you use to bring in new customers.

If you rely on an affiliate program as I do, make sure your entire systems hums like an engine.

– Double check your affiliate tracking.

Turn your cookies off on your web browser (usually in the privacy settings). Click on an affiliate link and you should see a message pop up asking if you want to allow the cookie.

There should be a way to view it. Inside, you should see an affiliate id. That is how you know the cookies work.

In my system, we can also place fake test orders to verify the tracking works.

– Make sure your affiliates go into your autoresponder and confirm. If you don’t have your affiliates in an autoresponder, find a way to get them in one.

– Make sure you have your commissions set up properly.

– Make sure you communicate weekly with resellers. (This is one I dropped the ball on in 2009 and we’re fixing in 2010. So if you’re one of my affiliates, you can expect more consistent and frequent communications.)

– Make sure that the return email address you use passes all tests. Go to mxtoolbox.com and run your domain through their tools to check for problems.

– Develop frequent new promotions for resellers. The minimum standard here is monthly.

This means new products or promotional tools for your affiliates to use.

– Perform a monthly test to make sure your tracking works as it should.

If you have some other way you bring in new customers, then create your own checklist for it to make sure you have it running on all cylinders.

If you don’t have a way you’re bringing in new customers, then pick ONE and do it. Get it going. Realize that usually any method takes tweaking.

For example, when my friend Joel Peterson runs pay-per-click ads, he often starts at a high cost-per-click and slowly lowers the price until he’s paying 1/4 of what he started with.

My friend Kirt Christensen does the same thing.

The point is, don’t expect it go great guns right out of the gate. Keep tweaking it and making little changes until you hit on the right formula.

I interviewed Sean Mize for the new product about traffic I’m working on. Sean is the king of article writing.

Every month he has outsourcers write hundreds of articles for him. He kept mucking around with that method until he turned it into a well-oiled machine.

Sometimes you have to do things a bit differently. One of my friends is crushing it with his affiliate program. But he came up with a unique offer for a few super affiliates that no one else is making them. You may need to add your own twist to what you’re doing to get the results you want.

3. Sort your results from 2009 from top to bottom, cut out the losing products or activities and plan to expand the ones at the top.

If you have multiple products you promote (whether your own or as an affiliate), create a ranking of products in order of sales.

This gives you a good idea of what to focus on more in 2010.

If you don’t have sales, rank the activities you DID do in order of effectiveness. It’s important to know what things were a good expenditure of your time and what weren’t.

You accomplish more by doing less by tracking what works and what doesn’t. Then cut out the things that work less well and do more of the few that work better.

4. Double check your email capture process

Pretend you’re a customer. Subscribe to your email list. Walk through the process.

Does it distract from your sales process? If it does, try something different.

I’ve always used “fly in” ads for email capture. But right now, I’m testing out an “inline” email form that goes right in the sales letter and is less of an interruption to the sales process.

On one of my sites, I found that after you joined the email list and clicked the submit button, you had to click the back button then X out the pop in order to read the sales letter.

You had to REALLY want our product just to wade through the obstacles to reading the letter. That’s why we’re trying out the “inline” email capture to see how that works.

Your emails and autoresponder broadcasts are your main tool for promoting your back end products. If you don’t know that terminology, just keep reading my ezine and I’ll get you up to speed on all the lingo.

5. Plan-Do-Check-Act

If I could only give you ONE tip for 2010, it’d be plan, do, check, act.

– Come up with a target condition

This is a result you want to achieve.

– Create a simple plan to get CLOSER to your target condition.

You do NOT try to do it all at once. Find something you can do you’re pretty sure will get you CLOSER. Now do that. If it works, find the next thing and do it.

If you have Ockham’s Razor, the principle applies. The simplest solution is usually the best.

What’s the LEAST you could to have a decent chance of meeting your target condition?

– Do your plan.

– Check to see if you got closer to your target condition or if you moved away from it.

This is one place a CHECKLIST comes in real handy. Actually, if you aren’t using checklists in every area of your business, now is the time to start.

– Act or adjust your plan based on that feedback.

I believe it’s absolutely essential to track your main numbers monthly like sales, leads, and affiliate sign ups and sales.

It’s very easy to implement ideas then forget to check to see if they made things better or worse! Not every idea works.

Inch-by-inch anything is a cinch. So just keep taking baby steps towards your target condition and you WILL get their by the end of 2010.

6. Zig When They Zag

It’s easy to get caught up in what everyone else is doing.

For example, everyone I know is focusing all their time and attention into building a continuity program.

I’ve revamped Ateam for 2010 but I don’t plan to make it the main focus of everything I do as some are doing.

Why?

Because of the law of supply and demand. When everyone does it, the supply goes up and the demand goes down.

To get caught up in that vicious cycle doesn’t add up to me.

NLP teaches a thing called “pattern interrupts.” You do what others aren’t.

The single most effective way to break through the noise is with pattern interrupts.

If you saw our S. Mouse emails, you probably experienced that first hand.

I’m also re-launching our Pizza Cast to affiliates:
http://www.promodashboard.com/pizzacast/

It’s definitely not the same old thing you see from marketers.

I’ve practically built my career on pattern interrupts. Do you remember my “Jumbo The Elephant” promotions for Push Button Letters?

If not, maybe I should revive those too.

I think there’s a time to learn from other marketers and do what they do. And there’s also a time to innovate and zig when they zag.

To me, that time is when everyone jumps on the bandwagon. By then, it’s too late.

7. Avoid getting so caught up in the details of running the business and learning new things that you neglect to focus 80% of your time and attention on getting new customers.

Here’s the truth:

Getting new customers isn’t easy. It’s the hard work of business. The “fun” and easy part is making sales to your existing customers.

So it’s EASY to get caught up in doing that.

But typically promotions for new customers never work as good as you want them to. I mean, by all means, if you stumble across something that brings in new customers like crazy, push on the gas pedal and don’t let up!

But short of that, it takes effort to bring in new customers. So it’s easy to neglect it.

However, the engine of your business is new customers. This is something you can’t let slide by the wayside.

———————————————————–
Marlon Sanders
The King of Step-By-Step Internet Marketing

Marlon is the author of “The Amazing Formula That
Sells Products Like Crazy”

Check out all my products here:
http://www.marlonsanders.com

Hope you enjoy it as much as the turtles and I have and check out the Best Of Marlon Sanders for more quality information.

Technorati Tags: check list, Marlon Sanders, planning

The turtles have been very lazy of late. The colder weather has slowed them down considerably and accept when they got their Christmas gift of feeder fish they either camp out on te bottom of the tank or lay under the light.

The colder temperatures have really slowed them down and I am too cheap to add a heater to their tank. (It will only cost money to heat it up and then more money for food )

The good point is that it has slowed their growth (they are growing out of this tank quickly) but they will need a new home shortly so they need to actually do some work to start raising the money.

After a long discussion they decided that they should be in the holiday spirit and give you something instead of trying to sell something. They (like me) are big fans of Marlon Sanders so they had an idea.

They want you to get the Best Of Marlon Sanders.

It is some of his best content and definitely worth the time to read it and apply it and you can get it for free.

So the turtles are back up on the dock sunning themselves under the lamp and wishing you a Happy New Year and hoping you go grab the Best Of Marlon Sanders and read and apply it today.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: Best of Marlon Sanders, free gift, Marlon Sanders

Well the turtles have been quite lazy since the weather got cold. The tank temperature has dropped and at times they seem almost dormant.

About the only time they get revved up is when I add some feeder fish and all of a sudden the idea of live food gets their motors going.

Imagine my surprise when I heard from for the first time in quite a while when I was checking out a new video from Marlon Sanders. All they understood was that signing up to watch the video got me a chance to win $300. After all they can’t do the math but they do understand that more money means more feeder fish. (Really think they are ruled by their stomachs .

What I liked was the actionable information that Marlon presented in the video “How To Promote In 3 Easy Steps”. Definitely worth your time to watch this one and at the cost of your email signup a great bargain. (Personally I feel you should be reading Marlon’s emails if you are a marketer as he provides great content.)

And you get a chance to win the $300 too, but if you do the turtles have asked if you at least forward a couple $$$’s for feeder fish beings they told you about it here.

Go check out Marlon’s video.

Have a great holiday too.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: free video, Marlon Sanders, promote, promotion, win 300

The turtles are primarily consumers. They don’t produce much of value although they are quite good at turning food into something else and messing up the tank.

Watching their actions though does teach lessons and that allows me to produce good content here. This past week end I got my Saturday missive from Marlon Sanders, something I always look forward to because he always has great actionable information. The key is to take action on it and with permission I will be adding it here because the turtles liked it too. (Well at least they did not fall asleep while I read it )

Are You Gonna Produce Or Are You Gonna Consume?

Subtitle: The real answer to why only 3% succeed and how to know if YOU will be part of the 3% or the 97%.

Are You Gonna Produce Or Consume?

Let’s get it straight.

All the money in this business is made by being a producer, not a consumer. Now, being a consumer is NOT bad or wrong.

But here’s the secret: You consume to produce.

Let me share a fact: It’s been estimated that 97% of customers of info products don’t make anything. Why? Because the never produce and promote.

They just consume and make up reasons why they can’t do it, why it won’t work for them, why they are different, why their situation is different, and why later not now is the time to start.

True story.

This fact is true of ANY info product business where you are teaching people how to do things. Whether it’s how to invest in stocks, real estate or anything else.

So realize this happens in EVERY industry, not just mine.

It’s really crucial that you get this straight in your head. For one thing, in the U.S., you are supposed to publish “typical results.” No one does. Why?

Because the typical result is 3%. Now, colleges do fair slightly better. 80% of the people who graduate with a degree NEVER work in the field they got their degree in.

So if 4 years of college and $50,000 or $100,000 can’t get people a $30,000 a year entry level job, why is it that a small minority of people with a chip on their shoulder, think they can buy a $97 course and with almost NO effort grab six figures?

Why is that? It makes no sense. That a human being with intelligence could think that baffles me. People want something where someone else gives them a defined set of instructions, they do it with no risk, and they get a check.

THAT is called a “job,” not a business.

You don’t push a few buttons and money magically appears — NOT until you have a list or form agreements with people who DO have lists. Then, yeah, you push a few buttons and money appears.

This is not a job. It’s a business. And by nature, business is volatile, uncertain and there is risk involved and no guarantees. If you can’t deal with that fact, keep your day job. Honestly.

If you’re lazy and think you’ll make 100 g’s a year by being dumb, stupid, in-informed and uneducated, keep your day job. But you’re about to be fired from there — so you better have a check up from the neck up.

There IS no room in the world for people who cannot produce and promote, even if all you’re promoting is yourself at your job.

On the flip side, if you take the number of people who product and promote at least 3 products with a degree of intelligence, diligence and effort, I imagine the results are pretty good, if not really good.

The reason 97% don’t get results is 90% or more didn’t REALLY give it their best shot. They stuck a toe in the water and “tried” just to see if “this thing is real.”

Well guess what?

That isn’t how it works.

You don’t read one book on chess, and enter a chess tournament to see “if this book is worth anything.” It’s a skill that takes practice and repetition.

“Yeah, but Marlon, all the sales letters say it’s easy.”

Actually, a few do but most by respected, legitimate marketers don’t. They promise to show you how THEY and maybe a few customers have gotten great results far above average (remember, the average result is nothing because people don’t implement at all or precious little).

Now, I LOVE being a consumer. I have vast libraries in my home because I love to read and learn new, exciting things. And when I speak, I speak from experience. I prefer consuming to producing.

Why?

1. Things go wrong when you produce.

The software doesn’t work, you can’t figure this or that out. Something doesn’t work right. That can lead to feelings of frustration or even feelings that somehow something is wrong with YOU that you can’t figure this out.

But follow me on this: Your FEARS of your own stupid feelings of failure or frustration. NOT of what it takes to get things done.

Murphy (Murphy’s law…look it up) is a part of any business.

2. Nothing works the first time

Write it down.

It never works out the way you want the first time. If that wasn’t true, then sports teams would only hold ONE practice session before they played games that counted.

Think about it.

Even the great Tiger Woods and the greatest athletes in the world practice over and over. Yet, to my absolute mystery, somehow a few people think they can have the Internet lifestyle by reading one ebook and working 15 minutes a day.

Please. Get real.

There IS an Internet lifestyle. But you pay your dues first. You learn, you practice, you test, you tweak and you learn some more. Now, I’ve seen that compressed into literally very short time frames.

My friend Jason Fladlien is 20 months into the Game and bringing in $30,000 to $50,000 a month BUT he has PRODUCED dozens of products in that time span and promoted them to a small list of only a few thousand names (but a list growing rapidly now).

Doesn’t matter you have a small list. THAT is how you start out. You start out, you produce and you hit singles or bunts to start with NOT grand slams.

If someone DOES hit a grand slam their first time at bat at product creation, THAT isn’t typical. Typical is like me — my first products hardly sold. Like
my one on how to avoid TV Repair Ripoff that I advertised in the TV Guide. If your TV was broke, would you be READING the TV Guide? Those are the dumb mistakes beginners make.

It’s part of the normal learning process.

Are you a NEWBIE? If you are, you can STILL produce $10 reports, little pdf’s or audios you sell, simple things.

Get in the HABIT of producing and promoting and not just consuming info until you are a bloated info glut.

I got a real problem with people who want and expect something for nothing. For people who think an ebook or even a coaching program will magically open the doors to the Internet lifestyle.

You produce and promote.

Like breathing.

Do it over and over and sooner or later you’ll pretty good at it and that’s when your luck finds you.

That’s when your money finds you.

That’s when success happens overnight.

Now it helps if you produce and promote things with the perception of value that people want to pay for. That helps a lot.

=================== So What DOES Work? ===================

What works is to produce while you consume. Start building your list, creating and promoting products.

THIS is what works.

Even if you’re not competent, even if you make mistakes, even if you get frustrated, even if you don’t feel you have the right to create a product, even if your web page is kinda ugly, even if you aren’t confident in what you’re doing, even if you don’t know everything, even if you aren’t a good writer, even if you sound less than perfect on audio.

NO EXCUSES.

You get your assets busy and you produce and promote.

Produce and promote.

Produce and promote.

Repeat after me.

Produce and promote.

Produce and promote.

It’s a mantra.

Say it now. Produce and promote. Produce and promote.

Stop over analyzing.

Stop your second guessing.

Stop making excuses.

This is the ONLY mantra that virtually guarantees your success….I say “virtually” because not everyone succeeds — at anything. Not everyone succeeds at golf, tennis or chess. Business is no different.

But as a general rule, if you persistently and relentlessly create, produce and promote products that are wanted and needed to audiences known to be passionate about buying and spending money, it’ll be hard for you to NOT succeed.

This is the straight and narrow path to success — the one I have been teaching and preaching since 1998 and before.

This is the EVERGREEN path to success. The money you spend to learn it won’t be wasted because it’s a skill. Producing and promoting never “stops working.”

Back in 0 B.C. people were producing crops and promoting or selling them. They were producing cows or donkeys or whatever and promoting and selling them.

This is evergreen.

It’s not as sexy or exciting as sending one email and having 100 g’s come in the door. The most read email I’ve had recently was the Terry Dean report I gave away about how he brought in 100 g’s by sending 1 email.

Which is all true.

But he had a list of qualified prospects to send that email to. But it shows that even on my list of people who hopefully read this ezine every week, people are entranced with the idea of pushing a button and having their bills paid for the year.

Get real. Honestly. Aren’t we both adults here? Aren’t you aware that the path to success lies in producing and promoting and not magic. Cavemen believed in magic. In third world countries where books and education are lacking, people believe in magic.

But you aren’t a caveman, you have books and the Internet and you’re in charge of educating yourself.

So cut the crap, forget the magic and get your assets busy producing and promoting. And if you don’t want to do that, keep your day job and seduce yourself into believing that your job is about something OTHER than producing and promoting, which of course it isn’t.

You just don’t have responsibility for the ultimate product and the exchange obtained for it. It’s a matter of what you FEEL you’re responsible for.

Those people who go in forms and complain that they “tried Internet marketing” and it didn’t work.

Did they produce and promote? Produce and promote?

No. They tried promoting affiliate products to a really low quality list they built using questionable, unproven methods because they wanted to “try it and see if it works” instead of committing to do it.

So someday when the NEWS hits the fan that “97% don’t make it in Internet marketing,” ask yourself out of those 97%, how many do you REALLY think followed the mantra 3, 4 or 5 times?

You know why people have jobs?

Because they are comfortable letting someone else do the hard work of producing and promoting, and they just want to be a cog in the wheel without much responsibility for producing and promoting the thing that is actually sold to the end buyer.

You STILL produce and promote on a job. But you have defined steps with a known outcome. That’s called a job.

An entrepreneur lives in changing markets and an uncertain world where any one product may or may not sell jack.

That’s life. That’s marketing.

You can do surveys and market research to put the odds in your favor. But it’s STILL uncertain. They cure is to produce and promote a LOT! Not a little.

So I got a question for you.

This next week are you ONLY consuming?

Are you ONLY reading my ezine?

Are you making excuses for all the reasons producing and promoting won’t work for you and how you need to wait for some reason, and why your equipment isn’t good enough, your voice isn’t good enough, your writing isn’t good enough, you don’t have the confidence and you aren’t sure it’ll work.

Or are you going to shut the muck up and produce and promote?

Really, this choice is yours.

Do you want a job?

Or do you want the Internet lifestyle?

If it’s the latter, start producing and promoting.

Marlon Sanders
The King of Step-By-Step Internet Marketing

———————————————————–
Marlon Sanders is the author of “The Amazing Formula That Sells Products Like Crazy and the KING of Step-By-Step Internet Marketing.”

To get on his killer ezine list, to get cheat sheets and all kinds of other goodies every Saturday and during the week, to get simple, to-the-point Internet marketing know that works real world without all the hype, go to: http://www.marlonsnews.com and subscribe

Hope you enjoyed this and if you are just starting you really should check out Marlon’s Promo Dashboard to have a perfect step by step plan ot start promoting.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: create products, Marlon Sanders, promote products

Last time I talked about how consistent the turtles are in re-arranging the tank no matter how often I reset it to my liking. In talking with a friend about that blog post, Joel Osborne, he brought up something I totally missed but was very true. Oh he has a great blog you should check out – Internet Marketing Blog.

His point was that quite often we try to sell things that our customers don’t want. I’ve been trying to sell the turtles on the fact that my way is the way the tank should look. You can see by the picture how well that is working or rather how well it is not.

They don’t want to buy my arrangement and have made it quite clear to me. Now as the tank is mine and they are only the tenants we will continue to have this argument over and over. Trying to do that with your customers is another story.

Very simply if you aren’t offering something they want you won’t make sales. PERIOD. End of story. That means no money for you.

Doesn’t matter how good the product is. Doesn’t matter how much your audience needs it. You can’t sell what they don’t want.

This is one of the reasons that I find it very important to start as an affiliate. Why create a product until you have an idea of what your customer wants not needs.

If you have done the research and found a profitable niche then start the process on the affiliate side. Follow what Marlon Sanders teaches in Promo Dashboard and build your system step by step.

• Research what they want
• Create an ethical bribe to build a list
• Send traffic to get subscribers from a variety of sources
• Sell them affiliate products through your follow up

Do that first (and Promo Dashboard will walk you through all of those steps in bite sized chunks) and then you will see what they want and can find the missing pieces in that niche that they will buy.

This allows you to be sure before you put the time and effort in that you have a product your customers want.

Do that and you won’t end up in a losing battle like I have with the turtles over the tank. Instead you will have a profitable product.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: affiliate marketing, Joel Osborne, Marlon Sanders, Promo Dashboard, want vs need

Today I needed to replace some of the water in the turtle’s tank. Swap out about 10-12 gallons once a week to extend the time between the big water changes which takes half a day to totally empty and replace everything including setting up a different tank for the fish and turtles while I do it.

Regular maintenance like this, changing the filters out regularly keep the tank looking good. By the way the picture is just cause I love to see Baby all stretched out on top of Gizmo – nothing to do with this article because there is a down side to that maintenance.

Before I start removing the water I always re-arrange the items they have moved and level out all the rocks they have dug up. This lets lose a bunch of what I’ll call gunk to be polite into the water and allows me to remove some of it with the water.

Then things get stirred up a bit more when I add back the water. This means that right after the maintenance the tank looks like crap. Now in a couple hours as things settle down it will look much better than it did but there will be that time frame when it doesn’t.

The thing is that can be true about your business sometimes but you still need to do it.

The maintenance falls into things like backing up your data bases for your blogs and scripts, checking your stats and reacting to what is working and what is not.

Then you need to actually take the time to change and test things. Sometimes this temporarily hurts your results when you are split testing but over time it improves your results. Not everything you test will work but if you keep improving your process it will grow your business despite the little bumps along the way.

This will allow you to find the things that work for you. Marlon Sanders new book Ockham’s Razor Income System has some great ways to improve your system when you apply them. Strongly recommend it as a resource to give you ideas to improve your business and improve your maintenance of your business.

Well, in about two more hours I will be able to enjoy the better looking tank (at least until the turtles once again start their re-arranging).

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: back up, maintenance, Marlon Sanders, Ockham's Razor Income System

Baby has found a mentor amongst the three other turtles. Gizmo has literally taken Baby under his wing and shows her the ropes.

Unfortunately I could not get a better picture of the two of them because Gizmo literally hides Baby under him when they are sitting on the dock.

These keeps the other big turtles from stepping in her.

He has actually chased Gizzard and the largest of the gold fish away when Baby is feeding and they try to push in. Not that he doesn’t make sure he gets his share but he does keep the gold fish at bay.

Was watching last night and Baby was swimming and the biggest goldfish started pushing baby around. Splash! (Yes when Gizmo jumps in there is always quite a splash.) The goldfish quite quickly decided to go to the other side of the tank and soon Baby was riding on Gizmo. (Did not have the camera handy and when I went for it Baby had already gotten off. Will need to keep the camera at hand more.)

The key is that Gizmo has protected and worked with Baby to show her the ropes of tank life.

Your business is the same way. It is really helpful to have someone that mentors you. It saves you making mistakes that have already been made (don’t worry there are plenty of others to find. I know for sure – have the t-shirt even.) and point you in the right direction.

One of those people for me has been Marlon Sanders. I own and recommend quite a few of his products but now he has a new “free” book out – The Best Of Marlon Sanders. I put “free” in quotes because you will not to give up your email address. Believe me it is worth it.

Marlon puts out weekly content each and every week and I guarantee that if you apply what he writes about you will get great value.

Go grab The Best Of Marlon Sanders

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: Best of Marlon Sanders, Marlon Sanders, mentor

Today I read a great article that reminded me of the turtles from Marlon Sanders. See the turtles become very focused when they want to move something as I have mentioned before. That is key and the following article from Marlon is a great review of two concepts.

Focus and perseverance.

Here’s Marlon

Are you gonna stay ON track or get off track?

(Why you gotta know what your model is and how it’ll cost you enormous amounts of wasted time, money and energy if you don’t)

Save this article for reference and use it as a reminder

By Marlon Sanders

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Are you gonna stay ON track or get off track?

Every week or every several weeks it seems like there is a new product launch promoted by all the usual suspects.

Nothing wrong with that.

A lot of these products bring fine value to the table.

They all show screen caps of huge amounts of dough brought in during relatively short time spans. The implication being that if they can do THAT, the smaller amount of money you need must be a piece of cake.

That’s all well and good.

But before you spend your $1,000 or $2,000, there are a few things you need to consider:

1. What will happen to the validity of the method once everyone jumps on the bandwagon?

This is a valid concern. Products that contain seo or ppc tricks are likely to NOT work after Google hammers down on ‘em, as Google seems to love to do.

Anytime anyone figures out how to beat others in getting an advantage with Google, and widely promotes it, it seems to break down. The BEST approach with Google is to seek out Evergreen strategies and things that aren’t widely promoted.

I see quite a few methods promoted where the promoter knows darned well that after the product launch, it’ll fall apart. PPC and SEO software programs or strategies are particularly vulnerable.

2. Is this method really valid for your normal marketer?

So let’s say John Doe made 1 million dollars in a second. All well and good. But how valid is the method for YOU?

For example, let’s say the money was made in a huge product launch in a niche. That’s fine. But do YOU possess the credibility to go into a niche and do the same thing?

The argument can be made you don’t need similar credibility. But is it true?

Or let’s say the person is killing it on Google PPC. But then you later find out they’re a super duper whiz with spreadsheets and have better attention to detail than an accountant.

Is THIS really gonna be your cup of tea?

If you’re good with numbers, go for it.

But if you aren’t, you might think twice. There’s more than one way to skin a cat as the old saying goes.

3. Is the product ALL strategy or are the actual technical details covered?

If you can handle the technical details on your own, then this isn’t a big ordeal. But what I see a lot is people buy products that are all strategy and they aren’t given the tools to actually implement them.

So for example, they may be told to create PDF’s, audio and video and distribute them to affiliates for promotions.

But there are no instructions on how to set up the affiliate program, create the pdf’s, audio and video.

So at the end of the day, you’re all EXCITED but NOT empowered to DO anything. To actually implement it. Sure, it sounded good. But where are the step-by-step instructions?

4. Does this method REALLY fit with your overall model or plan?

One of the things beginners and even intermediate marketers seem to have a problem with is choosing and sticking with ONE game plan.

You can sell affiliate products.

Or you can promote CPA offers.

Or you can create and sell your OWN products.

But you gotta pick one model and stick with it. Some would question that. But I just don’t think a person, especially someone relatively new to the business can do more than one of these effectively.

You use different methods to promote affiliate programs than you do CPA lead offers. And it’s a different learning curve for creating and selling your own products.

What often happens is you’re on one game plan. But then everybody and their dog promotes a new, more exciting method that sounds like a lot EASIER dough. So then you jump ship.

Until the NEXT easier method comes along.

Understand that the NUMBER of people promoting an offer has nothing to do with its actual value.

It has to do with how skilled a networker the person is and what their relationships are. That is, which cliche are they in?

Are they in the Cali cliche? The UK cliche? You know, there are different groups of marketers who all stick together and promote each others offers, even if they don’t feel it’s the best match to their philosophy or for their list.

Nothing wrong with this.

But you as an astute consumer should know what you’re looking at.

5. Can you sort out the different models?

There are a few basic approaches to the online Game:

a. Creating and selling your own info products
b. Selling on ebay
c. Promoting dropship products through seo
d. Promoting Clickbank products through ppc
e. Promoting CPA offers via ppc or paid advertising
f. Pure seo plays
g. Selling plr or reprint rights products
h. Joint venture marketing
i. Product launch plays (part of a)

When offers come out, you need to figure out FIRST which bucket it belongs in. And ask yourself if that’s the bucket you’re working on or specializing in.

Just because a chorus of angels (Internet marketers?) all swear a product they’ve never even seen yet is great doesn’t make it the cat’s meow. It might be.

Could be.

But your own examination and scrutiny is warranted.

If you’re doing PPC marketing and it’s an seo play, then pass.

If it’s a joint venture method that requires you to have your own products and you’re doing affiliate marketing stuff, then pass.

See, you gotta know what PLAY you’re running.

You can’t run one play and in the middle of it go, “Oh, wait. This sounds better. No wait! This grass is greener.”

One week marketers are all screaming…

PPC to Clickbank! It rocks. Buy this. So that is one model.

The next week it’s, “No wait. My bad. Product launches rock. Do that instead!”

Next week it’s, “Affiliate marketing rules! Forget what I said the last two weeks! Affiliate marketing is what it’s ALL about.”

This week it’s CPA marketing, “OMG — CPA marketing. It’s the greatest. Go over to my friends site because in 6 weeks when I do MY launch, I want him to reciprocate a mailing.”

The Game and the Dance of product launches, reciprocal emails and back scratching goes on and on.

Not that it’s wrong or bad. Hey, it’s business. And there’s nothing wrong with it. I promote on occasion for a few of my friends. Let’s be honest here.

But here’s the PROBLEM I got with it. A big problem. You, as the consumer, are often left scratching your head which way to go.

Now, in my business I teach people how to create and sell their own info products. That’s dominantly what I do.

And the reasons for that are many. I believe it’s the best long term, evergreen strategy, although it certainly isn’t the only one.

But I think of a massive product launch that was made based on getting top seo positioning and drop shipping products. Next thing you know Google had changed the rules!

And all of a sudden the chorus was pay-per-click marketing! So part or all of that learning curve you went through on the seo was WASTED and now it’s a NEW learning curve of PPC!

Which is good for the marketer because it keeps you buying info products and attending seminars and buying coaching programs.

But is it good for YOU the consumer?

Product launches are ALL based on something new and exciting. Because people easily get disenchanted with the work it takes to create and sell their own products.

Or the work it takes to really do ANY method, frankly.

There is no way to make a lot of dough that doesn’t require a brain or effort.

ANY method you use has some sort of Achilles heel. Something you won’t like about it. And you can do well with about ANY method.

I just like things where you go through the learning curve once, or as few learning curves as possible and they last.

Not that you’ll ever completely avoid learning curves.

What is your MODEL?

That’s the question here.

And are you going to STICK to your model when the going gets a little tough?

Or are you going to jump ship the greener grass on the other side of the road?

Think twice before you do.

That’s all I’m saying.

Because realize that marketers have a vested interest in selling you the greener grass on the other side of the road that spawns new learning curves, seminars and coaching programs.

Nothing wrong with that at all.

But you, as an educated consumer, should know what the Game is and how to play it for YOUR advantage, not the marketers.

Marlon Sanders

———————————————————–
For step-by-step help in stuffing your marketing funnel chock full and overflowing, check it out NOW!

Promo Dashboard

Understand that I like and use Marlon as a mentor. What I like is the no bull style and hope you take the article to heart.

The Turtle Dad

Technorati Tags: focus, Marlon Sanders, perseverance, Promo Dashboard