Entrepreneurs-Journey.com

You have to love the Internet marketing world. There’s a certain amount of jaded bitterness that surfaces when you sell something that presents a make money online opportunity. Every time I promote a product related to marketing or online income generation, there are those people out there who have adopted the belief that all marketers are liars and their products are more sales than substance.

Some might argue that it’s the hype - the language used to sell Internet marketing, in particular the long sales page format, that elicits the snarky comments or the sighs of “not again” from a handful of viewers. The disdain is palpable from some people and as much as I understand where they are coming from, it would be nice to only deal with satisfied customers.

You can’t please all of the people all of the time and everyone has a different experience and mindset, which isn’t always positive. No matter what you sell, there are people who will take issue with what you do and how you do it to the point where they feel the need to publicly state their disapproval.

I’m a bit tired of negativity, so today I’m going to relay to you three “golden nuggets” from three products I purchased from Internet marketers who sell Internet marketing products - the prime targets of the naysayers.

I spent at least $1,000 on each of these information products and they have all had a positive impact on my business and returned more than their cost in increased income and resource savings. Note these ideas - the nuggets - are just a sample of what I learned from the products and as anyone successful knows, it’s the two or three really powerful ideas that make a big difference.

Here are three examples -

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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

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If you missed the first part of this 2007 rap-up article, please go back and read it first here -

• How I Made Six Figures In One Day - 2007 Year In Review Part 1

The Eye of the Storm

The span of May - June - July was simply crazy. During this period I conducted my first online product launch, which is a massive task in itself, I bought a house, moved from my mother’s place to house sit my father’s place while I waited for the tenants to move out of my new house, completed the transfer of BetterEdit and maintained the status quo here at Entrepreneurs-Journey.com, writing several times a week.

Oh, and I bought a new car too.

Looking back it’s hard to imagine I managed to do all these things at once, but besides the few days around the launch of Blog Mastermind, I was quite calm and relaxed the entire time.

Nothing is more important than your health, so I made sure I kept exercising, sleeping and eating well, and avoided too much continuous computer use. I also have a core belief that despite how “major” all of these things might be to a person’s life, they are still all related to material possessions and not that important in the grand scheme of things.

If something went wrong, for example, I didn’t get the house loan or the BetterEdit sale fell through, or my membership site tanked at launch, it wasn’t that big a deal. I would move on and be okay. However, I was confident if I focused on staying patient and just getting things done, it would all unravel fine and I could look back with a feeling of satisfaction.

I’m happy to say, that is exactly what happened.

Choosing A Car

For about six years I didn’t have a car. I got my first car when I was 21, a second hand $3,000 Mitsubishi Cordia, but it was written off in a car accident a couple of years later. I then moved to West End, which was close to everything and has access to trains and buses to get anywhere I wanted to go. Then I headed to Canada for six months, so I didn’t need a car.

Posing in front of my new car

With the sale of BetterEdit and moving further away from town, I knew it was time to get mobile. Given the world is the way it is, with the rising price of petrol and the environment falling apart around us, fuel economy and low environmental impact were top priorities for my new car.

In 2007 Toyota released the Yaris in Australia, a car that matched most of my criteria and just happened to have a “cool” name - Yaro in his Yaris was already being bantered around by my friends. However the car isn’t all that pretty and I briefly fell under the temptation to purchase a more fancy car with part of the proceeds of the BetterEdit sale.

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I was listening to a fantastic call from Jeff Walker about email list building. Jeff’s the guy behind Product Launch Formula, the system I followed when launching Blog Mastermind and in my opinion a must have home study course for any person who is planning on releasing a product online (you can read my PLF review here).

Jeff does bonus calls now and then for his paying clients and they are always great. This one was particularly cool because I love the topic of email list building, but also because Jeff went into detail about a simple formula he uses to start niche businesses using blogs.

Here’s how the formula works:

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Read previous articles in this series:

• How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 1: Build Your Preeminence
• How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 2: Communication Channels
• How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 3: Technology
• How To Launch A Membership Site - Part 4: Content and Pricing

I’d like to tell you that your hard work is done, but really you have only just laid the foundation for a successful membership site and now the real work begins. Everything you learned so far in this series - building and demonstrating preeminence, finding ways to market, bringing together the right technology components, deciding on the content you will provide and how much you charge - all come together during the prelaunch and launch phase. This is the make or break time for your membership site - it’s the money time.

Triggers

Before discussing what you do during the prelaunch and launch phases in the next article I want to briefly relate to you some of the major triggers you are attempting to elicit in people. It’s these triggers that create the right conditions for people to feel comfortable making the decision to join your membership site - in fact they should feel an overwhelming compulsion to join if you use these triggers well.

Note that many of these elements are going to feel like you are “tricking” people, that you are attempting to force them into a decision that isn’t necessarily in their best interest by manipulating their emotions. Guess what - it’s true!

I don’t want to jump into a deep philosophical debate over the current state of our capitalist driven, self-serving, environmentally destructive, self-esteem crushing society in this article, but I can’t lie to you - everything you are about to learn is designed to make people desire something they don’t need (in most circumstances anyway).

Marketing is a social science - it’s the study of human behavior - and everything you are learning in this series relates to human behavior. Remember that marketing and these triggers are not inherently wrong, they are simply understandings we have come to as a result of testing. It’s what the knowledge is used for that the potential for abuse arises.

The problem is - and this is where the agitation many people feel towards marketing arises from - that we use our understanding of human behavior to manipulate people into making purchasing decisions for things they don’t need, purely in the interest of profit. It’s a self destructive formula that we feel the negative effects of every day, no person is immune to it and most of the problems in western society are at least somewhat related to it.

It’s not my job to present alternatives to these methods and frankly, I don’t have any good answers anyway. I personally make the decision every day to be a marketer and use these triggers when I run my business and I don’t think I could argue that anything I sell or recommend are necessities in life. I offer “wants”, not “needs”, chances are you do too.

What I can say to you is when you use these triggers that you attempt to be as “honest” as you can, which is the philosophy I apply. Don’t say anything you can’t back up, don’t make promises you can’t keep and use your own internal compass as a guide.

Now, with that out of the way, let’s take a look at these triggers.

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