New Product Launches For This Week
David Bain sent me a preview copy of his 26 Week Internet Marketing Plan and I’ve been diligently going through it in my travel time – but it’s a monster! – so I haven’t finished studying it yet.
The program is a fantastic down-to-earth Internet marketing home study course that I believe is ideal for small business managers to get a hold of if they need to learn the entire framework of successful Internet marketing.
I was very glad to see sections on both blogging and RSS in the materials, along with pay per click, press releases, article marketing, social media marketing, podcasting, video marketing, email marketing, conversion testing, keyword research and much more – it’s darn comprehensive, that is for sure!
David is a very up to date Internet marketer and it shows given the nature of the topics he focuses on, using blogs as a focal point for Internet marketing in the current environment. He has also a cool accent (Scottish) and for an interesting twist, his product is priced in pounds!
If you are a small business owner or manager and want a complete package to cover this hefty topic without trudging around all the blogs and websites that briefly look at each of the individual elements, check out the 26 Week Internet Marketing Plan by David Bain.
Product Launch Formula 2.0
Jeff Walker has started the release process of his new Product Launch Formula 2.0 program and he’s already begun to give away free information about conducting product launches online.
His first video is a nice introduction to what is possible from conducting online launches and in particular focuses on markets NOT related to Internet marketing – even a $140,000 launch in the Dressage market! (I you don’t know what Dressage is, think horses).
You can watch the video here – http://www.productlaunchformula.com – and make sure you opt-in so you get email notification when Jeff sends through more videos and resources.
I have to admit I’m actually excited about this launch, more so than the others that came through over the previous months, because I’ve actually done product launches and experienced first hand how good they are. If it wasn’t for the product launch formula I would not have jumped from earning four figures to earning six figures a year online.
Of all the marketing I have studied, Jeff’s concept is by far the best, based on my experience. It’s a great system for bloggers who are intending to sell a product via their blog or anyone who wants to release an information product online. I especially recommend it to anyone considering a launch in a non-Internet marketing niche because the techniques will seriously kick-butt since they are not overused…yet.
Every Internet marketer should follow this formula, yet so few seem to bother, they just stick up a sales page and hope that they will make money if they can drive traffic to it. That just seems foolish to me. It’s way more fun building buzz and giving away free stuff. I much prefer to make sales after giving away quality content – who wants to rely just on a sales page to make sales? – I prefer people to be sold before they even see the sales page.
I’m going to talk more about product launches as Jeff releases his pre-launch materials. To make sure you get notification of all the free stuff – opt-in here:
http://www.productlaunchformula.com
Rich Schefren New Beginnings Conference
I’ve been popping in to Rich Schefren’s blog all week to watch the video snippets coming from the presenters at the New Beginnings Conference that just wrapped up. The videos are awesome because they are all under 5 minutes and contain a quick and powerful tip taken from a presenter (I liked Frank Kern’s the best).
If you haven’t visited, go see the blog and click the face of any of the presenters to watch their video -
http://www.strategicprofits.com/blog/
As expected, Rich is releasing the conference presentations on DVD and text transcripts, and you have about two days to order a copy according to the count down timer at the site as I type this.
I’m so impressed with Strategic Profits. The fact that Rich and his team can put on a huge event at Disneyland, produce plenty of video updates on the blog and release the videos on DVD as a home study literally the day after the event ends, shows how tight the company is. That’s some serious efficiency, which is something I admire a lot given how long it takes to get things done in my business – yet more proof that Rich practices what he breaches in his coaching program – he has a system, not just a business.
Now I’m going to go email Rich and ask for a copy of the DVDs for review 
If you are interested in buying the DVDs from the event, here’s the long sales page -
http://www.strategicprofits.com/live08/
That’s enough about product launches for today. Have a good weekend everyone and happy leap year!
Yaro Starak
Product Pitcher
How To Use Paypal Shops To Find Hot Selling Products
This is a cool tip and I have to give credit where it’s due before I dish it out to you. I first came across the idea while listening to an interview with Terry Dean, a very well known Internet marketer who has been doing the online money making thing for years. He’s also one of the only pure Internet marketers I’ve seen really embrace blogging as a tool to build an email list. You will see his blog has a pop-up opt-in form to join his list, which will definitely annoy some people but I suspect is converting well for Terry.
Now let’s look at this very underused method for finding topics and hot products using Paypal Shops to determine what people are spending money on. This is so easy it blows my mind it hasn’t been talked about before and that could be because people don’t know about it. I’m probably eroding someone’s secret advantage by publishing this one!
Every Small Business Should Use This Marketing Method
On the weekend I attended a workshop by Australian copywriting expert Pete Godfrey.
The room was full of a variety of people and I was pleased to hear that it wasn’t all about Internet marketing. There was a lot of advice handed out for small business owners in any market and plenty of people in the room were from traditional companies who do normal things like sell widget type stuff – you know, physical goods offline. People like mechanics and printers were in attendance, and also a few people looking to become better sales writers like journalists and budding freelance copywriters.
Today I want to pass on some of the biggest lessons from the workshop that every small business owner needs to think about.
The Money Is In The Relationship
Pete was quick to point out that the money is not in the list but in the relationship you have with your members. He teaches that you need to foster a “tribe”, a group of core customers who buy from you not just because of your good service, but because they have a real vested interest in you and what you do.
To facilitate relationship building Pete recommended the use of a newsletter, but in this case not your typical online email newsletter (though Pete certainly agreed you want one of them too!), but a print newsletter you send to people via oldschool snail mail.
The Print Newsletter
Pete showed a copy of his print newsletter that he charges $49 a month to subscribe to and also a copy of a free print newsletter one of his clients use (a car parts wholesaler).
You Have To Sell The Push Button Solution
Catherine left a comment to my last post – If Long Sales Pages Work, Why Do You Hate Them So Much? and there was a part of it I want to highlight -
You download a free ebook and invest some time reading it – then you get halfway through and realize that it’s nothing more than a sales pitch for an expensive product.
Now, I feel cheated when that happens, because the author is wasting my time. But, I guess some people don’t.
My initial thought-response to this was that obviously those marketers who provide a genuinely helpful resource for 90% of the content and sell their more expensive product for 10% of the content should do fine. You earn the right to pitch your product after delivering so much value before this.
Some books, blogs and email newsletters seem to have the ratio a bit screwed up and you feel the pitch way too early and way too often, yet this can work still – so what is with that?
The Push Button Solution
The average consumer when looking to solve a problem wants the following in a solution -
If Long Sales Pages Work, Why Do You Hate Them So Much?
Some of you are not going to agree with this, but it’s the truth.
Raise your hand if you are put off by those long form landing sales pages you see that are used to sell online?
Yep, it seems a lot of you stuck your hand up.
Let me ask you another question -
If you were selling something online would you use the best known tools available to promote or would you prefer to sell using what you considered acceptable?
It’s okay to deliberately choose not to use something to uphold your principles or because you don’t want to be seen as doing something in the past you have not approved of or disliked when others use.
However, you need to be clear about your goals. Are you willing to make fewer sales and less money, potentially even kill an entire project because of these principles?
Why Do You Hate It So Much?
Every single time I’ve sent out a link to a product that uses a long sales page or landing page inevitably a few people leave comments complaining about the use of such ‘annoying’ pages.
The last post to this blog prior to the one you are reading now reviewing the Desperate Buyers Only book linked to a long sales page.
A few people noted in comments to the review that they don’t like products that use such sales pages. I expect these people didn’t buy. According to my stats at least 19 people have purchased because of the review (so far). Whether that’s a good result or not is subjective, but I’m always happy when I sell over $1400 from one blog article.
