Want Free clips of my “Tsunami Seminar” this week?

The Maui seminar kicks off Monday morning March 1 and I'm flying to Hawaii as you read this.

Our seminar was ready to go, and then…. Chile had an earthquake and Hawaii was suddenly threatened with IMMINENT DESTRUCTION.

My SEO guy, Donovan Kover, narrowly escaped to safety on the side of a volcano. He waited with baited breath as the deadly waters poised to strike him dead.

Then….

This Twitter Tweet from @Mayerinated says it all:

"OMG Hawaii just swallowed by a 1 1/2 foot tsunami wave! OMG everyone panic now! Run for your lives! AAAAAAAHHHHH!!!"

I asked my team: "OK, so if I re-name my event "Perry Marshall's Tsunami Seminar" is it going to sound anti-climactic?

Everybody replied, "Hey you might as well ride the publicity, uh, wave."

I like it. It's sorta tongue-in-cheek. It's not about the size of the Tsunami. It's about the fact that the media INVENTS a Tsunami every dang day, to freeze you into inaction.

You know they make their money by having you scared and hypnotized in front of the TV, right? Totally flaccid.

(You might want to remember that they didn't murmur a single word about the Tsunami that DID kill 200,000 people… just sayin'…)

Well anyway, if you want daily updates – maybe several times a day – come back to this page. I'd also love your thoughts, comments and questions below.

Enjoy the Tsunami Seminar!

Oh, and by the way – you can get the seminar streamed to your computer, and on DVD and MP3. Sign up now and get the most advanced Pay Per Click seminar EVER in the history of marketing:

Perry

P.S.: This seminar's gonna be awesome. It will NOT be anti-climactic. Post your questions & comments below.

PJ Eby: The Leverage Point & the Million-Dollar Question

I'd like to direct you to a groundbreaking 2-hour interview Jack Born and Bryan Todd did with PJ Eby. PJ is a mindhacker extraordinaire and I love his "engineering way" of slicing through mental cobwebs.

We've posted a 2+ hour interview in the Renaissance Club members' area. You can get the highlights for free here.

In the interview PJ tells you:

• Why the idea that "different things work for different people" is actually a MYTH, the hidden reason why it SEEMS to be true, and why this will produce a *breakthrough* in your focus and decision-making
• The outrageous secret of finding leverage points *everywhere* in your business, that INSTANTLY turns your biggest problems into your greatest opportunities
• Why arriving at the right conclusions about your business is *not* a matter of luck or raw intelligence… and what the real difference is between those who succeed, and those who struggle. (Hint: it's something anybody can do… as long as they're not afraid of feeling silly or uncomfortable.)
• Exponential Priorities – the simple system of decisionmaking that delivered million dollar projects in record time, and makes it literally IMPOSSIBLE to have conflicting goals or unclear priorities.
• The Million Dollar Question – a simple, but surprisingly controversial question that "cuts the crap" and confusion out of your vague goals and wishes… but only IF you dare to ask it!
• What simple thinking process Bryan Todd *swears by* for product and event planning, that he calls, "the single most productive 20 minutes of the entire week, [that sets] the stage for everything…. Without it, [I'd be] sunk."

I first met PJ at my own 80/20 seminar. His Leverage Point approach is all about systematically separating the "trivial many from the vital few" in choosing what parts of your business to focus on when – not by guesswork and opinion, but by systematic evaluation.

This interview is perfect for you if: (1) You're working hard, but not getting the results you'd like, (2) you feel overwhelmed because you know there are at least a dozen things you HAVE to do to make progress, but you just can't figure out where to START… let alone how you could ever FINISH all of it; (3) you want more control and focus in your existing business, so that you can really "take it to the next level" and create a financial and personal life that gives you the freedom and fulfillment you deserve.

If any of these things apply to you, you're in for a MAJOR revelation, beginning with just ONE simple idea that will massively increase your ability to prioritize and focus where your smallest actions can have the biggest effect … at your own personal Leverage Point.

If you're a Renaissance Club member, just click here to go straight to the members' area and hear the interview.

If you're not a Renaissance Club member, click here to become one now, and receive this interview (a $147 value) as a free bonus.

Sincerely,

Perry Marshall

p.s. This 5-minute highlight from the interview illustrates an unusual study on peak performing swimmers and why the "difference that made the difference" was not effort or training.

Get 4 More Highlights of PJ Eby's The Leverage Point

First Name *
Email *

On these 4 highlight audios you'll hear PJ explain:

• The IDOC technique he developed for breaking through mental roadblocks
• Why the limiting factors holding us back are usually internal, not external
• How it is that you might be held back by "what pushes you forward"
• Why it makes sense to view your inner dialogue as queries a programmer runs on a computer

Affiliate Keyword Matchmaking: CashKeywords

In the Affiliate Bonus Module for the 2010 Definitive Guide to Google AdWords, I interview an affiliate marketer known as "Mr. X." He tested something like 200 different affiliate offers before one hit pay dirt.

Now he enjoys a strong 6-figure income and he quit his attorney job several years ago.

Yet….had there not been a gal right there in his own law office who was making a cushy affiliate income on the side (and driving a BMW), he would've thrown in the towel long before he achieved success.

The secret to keyword-driven affiliate marketing is using a systematic method to match keywords to high-conversion offers. If you just guess without the benefit of high-power analysis tools, you're throwing darts in a blizzard.

Consider this:

• There's no such thing as a sidewalk without a crack in it and there is NO SUCH THING as a market without a hole in it. Ever. Like Gary Bencivenga said, "Any computer can be hacked; any safe can be cracked."
• The upside of keyword marketing is: There's an infinite range of possible combinations of keywords and offers. You can never run out of opportunities.
• The downside of keyword marketing is: There's an infinite range of possible combinations of keywords and offers. You could test endless BAD combinations until you die.
• "Black Belt" marketers with red-hot offers and world-class sales pages dominate high traffic keywords and they're immensely difficult to compete with. But if you're immersed in a niche and you tailor your message to that niche, you can always wedge your way in.

Go to the woods or visit a pond or lake and you'll see what I mean. See how many different kids of creatures thrive in that ecosystem. Loons, dragonflies, ladybugs, foxes, bobcats. Pines, maples ferns, every imaginable kind of flower – they all have their place. Each animal is fierce and fully equipped to compete, in its own special way.

So too must you be.

I only do paid endorsements for vendors I completely trust. One of my most-trusted Keyword geniuses is Stephen Juth. He's a long-time student and creator of AdWord Accelerator. He's now introduced a new Windows-based tool called Cash Keywords. It's a desktop Search Engine that matches keywords to offers at high speed.

See this video where Stephen shows you how he plays keyword-affiliate matchmaker in minutes.

Stephen says:

* Cash Keywords Pro will help you to slice, dice and dissect your market within a matter of minutes by collecting keywords, filtering and segmenting your results, and then allowing you to quickly analyze trends, demographics and FAQs for them.  This will help you to get deeper into your visitors' heads and is one of the biggest and best benefits.

It liberates you from the 'keyword candystore', and is a great way to find cheaper PPC keywords, long tail keywords for SEO, information-based search terms, high volume queries, etc.  (It's hard putting this into words since there are a variety of things that can be done using various combinations of tools, filters and segmentation.  It's sort of like building with Legos.)

* It will help you to quickly locate the strongest affiliate offers within a vertical (or niche) across multiple networks (three more will be added in March).

* It will find the highest paying keywords for Google AdSense for any market.

* It provides step-by-step action guides to allow you to point-and-click your way through keyword research.  (These are not in place yet but will be available soon and will be a BIG help for many).  I showed an example of one in video #8 on our blog.

In this video, Stephen shows you how he matches keywords to offers in minutes.

Perry Marshall

Cheat Sheet Collection (PPC and Beyond)

Glenn, I don’t have time, could you make more cheat sheets?”

OK, OK … so here’s 21 of my absolute best quick and dirty money making cheat sheets (right click and download the ZIP file) including:

- How to corner your market
- How to master the conversion optimizer
- 7 uncommon reasons internet businesses fail
- My 10 most important business insights of the decade
- How to Taguchi test in adwords
- How to profit from  word of mouth URLs today
- The content network curse
- Getting more content network impressions
- Working with display advertising on the content network
- Domain name testing in Adwords after 2009
-  Automatic Broad Match
- The Livingston Broad Match Magic approach to competitive market entry…
- Hyperresponsive Surveys…
- Mining for negative keywords…
- PPC XRay..
- Multivariate email testing…
- Self esteem and purchase behavior…
- Adwords mysteries…

And more!

Don’t say I never gave you anything

Like this stuff?  Then get your ass into my hyper-responsive marketing club so you can REALLY put it to use before I raise the price forever (on Friday).

G

-

Perhaps I Frighten You?

It’s not Halloween, but I still scare people.

You all know I’m really just a big hairy teddy bear, but my work is pretty intense. I suggest looking at your marketing landscape very carefully, putting numbers on it, and burying yourself in all the valuable free information you can get before you start throwing money at your marketing problem.

Know why I do it?

Because it’s a jungle out there, and it’s only getting worse.

1 Billion+ people online and growing, but only 21 slots on the search engine results page (11 paid, 10 organic) for any given market. And we all know you gotta be on page #1 or you’re building billboard in the woods.

Brutal!

Someday, as competition heats up and more and more advertisers get online, you won’t be able to make a dime without doing what I suggest, I’m sure. And all the bright shiny objects will vanish in the wind.

But for now, I’ll reserve my work for the few and the proud.

Care to join us? (price goes up on Friday)

Facebook Advertising Success

Just how big is Facebook, really?

According to TechCrunch, big enough to encroach on Yahoo's position of "third largest Web property in the world", trailing none other than Google (#1) & Microsoft (#2).

In the U.S., Facebook already has the second highest number of unique visitors per month - surpassing Yahoo for the first time in January. Compete.com also reports that of all time spent online in January, 11.6% was on Facebook, compared to less than 5% on Yahoo and Google each.

What does this mean to you?

Well, I don't have the answer to that question, but I can tell you what it now means to some of our clients for whom we've recently started advertising on Facebook --> more qualified customer leads + a desirable cost = more $$$ for them.

The following story is about a lead generation client (Client A, for anonymity), but Facebook would certainly be worth testing if you're in an e-commerce space too.

We created Client A's Facebook account back on January 26. He's a local advertiser, only seeking clients within a close radius of a heavily populated metro, so we set the Facebook geo-targeting to just 10 miles around his city.

Within 18 days his campaign spent just over $500, generating almost 600 clicks, but these numbers don't tell the whole story yet:

When we dig into our Google Analytics reporting for Client A's Facebook PPC traffic, we can see that his $500 in spend produced 11 highly valuable customer leads:

By highly valuable, I mean that Client A knows his customer lifetime value and has been able to determine that each new customer lead is worth $600 to him.

So for a ~$500 cost, with 11 new customer leads worth $6,600 (11 x $600), we're talking about a superior ROI from Facebook in just 18 days!

It's important to note here that Facebook is only producing 5.5% of the overall leads from our top 5 traffic sources, so it's not going to replace Google AdWords anytime soon. Facebook is however, turning out to be a solid supplemental lead source for Client A.

1. Track your conversions with a reporting service like Google Analytics.
2. Utilize Facebook's demo/geographic targeting to focus on a niche audience.
3. Set your bid price within Facebook's suggested CPC bid range.
4. Use a captivating image in your ad (you can combine an image with text).
5. If you generate a strong impression share initially, but then it trends downward over time, you should rotate new ad creatives to keep a fresh message in front of your audience's eyes.
6. If you are unable to generate any substantial impression share at all, then try experimenting with different or fewer demographic segments. You can also try targeting a larger geographic area to boost your ads' reach.

Facebook advertising is included in our paid search management service, get the full story on what we can do for you.

I Am Ugly, Oh So Very, Very Ugly

It’s confession time, and I’m finally ready to admit it… I’m ugly.  Oh so very very ugly.

I’ve tried for 4 years now to make what I do seem sexy, but it’s not.

That’s why you don’t see any beauty contests for marketing researchers.  No bikini babes lined up with surveys and statistics.  No hunky t-shirts of 45 year old men showing their market segmentation tables and graphs.   No endless, seemingly irrelevant display ads stalking you across the internet which say “click here for some hot market research action”.

And nobody really wants to talk about market research at parties.

Because market research isn’t a “bottom line function”, it’s just not that attractive.

Most marketers would rather jump into the market and try to make money right away, slogging it out on the battle field, licking their wounds as they go along.  But I’d rather sweat in training than bleed in battle.

So I’m constantly imploring people to avail themselves of the literally hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of FREE information available today online.  To slow down, digest and organize it all, choose their targets carefully, and plan their attack methodically.

Which somehow makes me the bad guy in their minds.  Because I’m not as sexy as the newest traffic technique, or the quickest way to make money this week.

Oh well, I guess I’m destined for an ugly life, having a (comparatively) small but rabid group of followers who make more money doing rather than teaching.

A group of Ugly Tortoises with X-Ray Vision and steadily growing businesses, not flash in the pan booms and busts.

I guess people don’t really want to see that at the beach.

But  I honestly can’t see any other way.

And you know who DOES think market research is sexy?

Fortune 100 companies who can afford it. I’m NOT talking about the DUMB brand managers who go without research and just consult their wife for an opinion on which poodle to show in the ad. I’m talking about the smart companies who research the hell out of their markets before they spend $20,000,000 on an advertising campaign.

To them, $100,000 for a research project is a drop in the bucket, they do those day in and day out. I ought to know, I’ve done plenty of them.

But what if I told you that you could get MORE information about your market for $77 than than these companies are getting for $100,000? What if I reminded you that I used to conduct those projects, and have translated these research principles into practical, easy to implement, step by step procedures and illustrated them all in over my shoulder videos and cheat sheets?

Would you still hesitate to join before my final price increase?

Because I’m going to jump the price from $77 to $97 on Friday morning. And because I NEVER increase the price on existing members, this is your last chance to LOCK IN YOUR RATE to learn this ugly, ugly form of marketing, tested and proven in over a dozen markets, and honed over a lifetime of an ugly researcher’s career.

So? How about a little kiss? Yes?




PS – My stuff USED TO be difficult. It USED TO make people’s brain’s hurt. Not any more… now it’s EASY, just not sexy. (Kind of like this lady above). But I know you’ll be happier with the results! Price jumps from $77 to $97 on Friday

You’re awesomer than you think you are.

When I was in 8th grade I was in the boys room at school and heard this whooshing sound coming out of a hole in the wall. I smacked it with my notebook a few times to see it it would sound any different.

Didn't make it sound any different.

Just then, Mr. B, one of the teachers, heard the noise and walked in, grabbed me, and ushered me back to my classroom. He informed Mr. C, the art teacher, that I had been slamming my notebook against the wall in the bathroom and needed to be brought under control.

Mr. C made me come in after school to talk to him about this incident.

After school I go to his room. There were a couple of other people in the room working on art projects, and Mr. C sat me down and said, loud enough for everyone else to hear, "Perry, I'm really concerned about you. Do you need some kind of professional help? I can arrange for that if you want. Maybe you need to talk to someone about your problems."

I can tell the girl across the room, who is working on a painting, can hear everything that is going on. But she's politely trying to look like she's ignoring it. I feel a hot flash of humiliation sweep through my body. I maintain a stony face and ignore Mr. C's questioning. He and I had a hostile relationship to begin with, and it felt like he was deliberately trying to shame me.

Finally after 10 minutes of getting nowhere, he released me and I walked home.

Years later, it occurred to me that I probably *could* have used some professional help right about then. My dad had gotten demoted from his job because my mom had gone bi-polar, our whole entire life was fighting and bedlam from the time I got home from school to the time I went to bed, and a couple of kids at school were threatening to beat me up. My only escape was my music, my electronics catalogs and my stereo.

Surely everybody ought to know you can't humiliate a 13 year old kid into bettering himself.

Frankly I don't know ANYONE who doesn't have some kind of story like that. A time when you really could have used an encouraging word and someone decided to rub salt in the wound instead. Some people let those stories define who they are. The rest of their life becomes some sort of revenge on Mr. C.

Maybe they succeed to show Mr. C was wrong. Or maybe they fail to show Mr. C that he was unable to teach them anything useful.

Whatever.

Personally, I don't think you ever get much of anywhere if you let Mr. C define you. I think the best thing you can do is forgive Mr. C and decide that it's God's job to fix him, not yours. Actually it's tremendously freeing to get the bitterness monkey off your back.

What's REALLY going to propel you, I think, is the people who DID believe in you.

Mrs. Washburn, my kindergarten teacher, told my parents she thought I could be president if I wanted to be. Honestly, I can't think of any job I'd enjoy less than running the biggest political machine in the world, but that wasn't the point. She believed in me. My mom told me what Mrs. Washburn said over and over again until I believed it.

Mrs. Snoberger was my high school counselor and when my dad died of cancer and I was just starting my stereo business, she was the one who pointed out to me that very few kids are that entrepreneurial at age 17. She thought I was special. She wrote some recommendation letters that helped me get a much-needed scholarship.

Dr. Knoll was my college English teacher when I was 20. He was the first person to ever explain to me that I understood people *AND* things. He said most people are good at one or the other but not both. (I didn't know that.) He predicted that I would someday be good at technical sales, and maybe even the president of a company.

It was mind-bending for me to even contemplate such a thing, back then. I was so keenly aware of my *limitations.*

Those words of encouragement from Mrs. Washburn, Mrs. Snoberger and Dr. Knoll carried me very, very far. It's not even like those conversations were very long. It's just that they had impact.

My friend, you've had your Mr. C's and you've had your Mrs. Snobergers. You had them both. You get to decide who you listen to. Let's just admit, they *might* both have been telling you some version of the truth.

But some truths are told to harm. Others are meant to heal.

The words that will propel you forward are the healing words. Not the hurts.

I've got this lady who consults for me, her name is Sue. One of her jobs is, literally, to pray for my customers. I know that sounds kind of strange, but I truly believe that every single day, thousands of people out there are on the edge. The edge of either discouragement or encouragement. The edge of either success or failure. The edge of negative judgment or positive inspiration.

I can only hope that when I blast out these crazy emails to my various lists of thousands of people, that I'm helping at least a few of them break whatever chains that have held them back. Whatever limitations of knowledge or belief, whatever barriers of confidence and security.

Because you're only going to build a successful life out of your strengths.

Last night, after an exhilarating, exhausting Sunday, my buddy Nathan and I went out for burgers at 10pm. We were relaxing and unwinding at Bar Louie, bantering, philosphizing, solving the problems of the world.

Nathan says, "What if we're aweseomer than we think we are?"

I smile and look at him. "Yeah… what if?"

He says, "What if we're really operating at less than our potential simply because we don't realize what our potential really is?"

I say, "We ALL are capable of even greater things.

"Dang, Nathan, that would make a great Facebook post."

I get home and post. This morning, Jack Born, my resident marketing genius, replies with this quote:

"Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light not our darkness that frightens us. We ask ourselves 'who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?'

Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small doesn't serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.

It's not just in some of us; its in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same….

As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

-Marianne Williamson

Amen, Jack and Marianne. One last thought for you:

During the last couple of years, most of our friends, including ourselves, have hit some MAJOR  crucibles in life. One friend's husband left her for another woman. Another's 13 year old son died of leukemia in October. Another has major chronic health challenges. Another came to the brink of losing their marriage.

Another has battled a series of addictions. Another has been beleaguered with financial setbacks. Another lost pretty much everything in the real estate crash. Another had two businesses fail and is $800,000 in debt – which is about 10X his current annual income.

But with only a very few exceptions, everyone has stood proud and tall and NOT run from their problems. They have extended their roots, they have deepened their relationships with their closest friends, they have strengthened their faith, they've honed their ability to listen and their resolve.

They've become stronger, more resilient, more joyful, more resourceful, more centered.

I am immensely, indescribably proud of all of them. Better days are coming.

My friend, life is either going to polish you up or grind you down. Focus on the polishing, not the grinding. Focus on the end result.

Please listen to everything the laboratory of life is trying to tell you. And never ever forget:

YOU'RE AWESOMER THAN YOU THINK YOU ARE.

Perry Marshall

State Popularity: the latest addition to the GARE

We have another new addition to the Google Analytics Report Enhancer, thanks to Ophir Prusak of Google Analytics Authorized Consulting firm POP. This metric helps to interpret the significance of visit counts at the US State level. You can hear the rest of the story by reading Ophir's excellent post on the metric.

Now that State Popularity has joined the GARE family, it's a great time to download the latest version of the Report Enhancer. Here are the steps:

1. Get Firefox
2. Get Greasemonkey
3. Get the GARE

In addition to the new metric, I've also been able to improve the way additional metrics are added to tables, including better sorting and handling of advanced segments and compare to past.

So how is State Popularity calculated anyway? I'm glad you asked!

First, the number of visits for each state is divided by the population of that state, according to the latest estimates. That's the easy part. What you're left with are some very small numbers that don't really give a good idea of significance.

The obvious way out of this is to multiple each ratio by the same number to make them more human friendly. I decided that rather than picking a static number, like 1,000 or 100,000, I would multiply each ratio by a number so that the total of all adjusted ratios would be equal to the number of visits. To do this, I divided each ratio by the sum of all ratios, then multiplied by the total number of visits.

The main benefit to multiplying the ratios by this number is that you can tell whether you are getting a high number of visits even from a smaller state by comparing the State Popularity number to the number of visits.

For example, if the State Popularity is higher than the number of visits for a particular state, then you know that you're getting higher than average visits from that state based on its population. If it's lower, then the number of visits from that state is less significant.

The problem with this method, from a Google Analytics standpoint, is that it's difficult to calculate the sum of all the ratios unless they're visible, that is, at least 50 rows are showing (though usually more because of D.C. and (not set)). To handle this, I had to make my own requests for the data that included all of the rows and pre-calculate the totals. The map overlay also has its own peculiarities that make it difficult to make table additions persistent.

What makes this significant is that it in the past, I could only create new metrics based on metrics in a single table. But now, theoretically, I should be able to calculate metrics based on more than one table.

I'll probably be able to think of some good use of this technique before too long, but if someone else has an idea of what metric they might like to see, let me know! You never know, your new metric may be the next addition to the GARE.

The gigantic horrible lie about education

In public education there's an idea that there are certain things everyone is supposed to know in Kindergarten. Then there's some other things all the kids are supposed to learn in first grade and some more things in 2nd grade and so on.

Then when you finally graduate from high school, you know all the stuff you're "supposed to know."

How's that plan been working for you, anyway?

What capability does a high school kid possess on the day he crosses the stage with his diploma at his graduation ceremony?

Generally, he possesses the ability to get a $7 per hour job at Wal-Mart or TGI Friday's.

Wow. What a milestone that is, after 13 years of academic achievement. Really inspires you to do what the principal was droning about at the graduation ceremony – strive to be a student for the rest of your life.

No wonder most people spend the next 40 years of their colorless existence watching re-runs of 3rd Rock from the Sun.

OK, so here's the problem with the "this is the list of things everybody should know" theory:

It turns living, breathing, unique human beings into commoditized, dehumanized hunks of flesh. 140 pounds of human capital. Where your highest aspiration is to get a few more right answers on the test than everyone else in the class. Where everyone knows how to do all the same things and compete with 100 other people for the same dumb job.

If the very thought of that makes you want to run out of the room screaming, good. It's a sign the beast hasn't gouged every last ounce of self-respect out of your soul.

Rage against the machine.

When you watched Morpheus offer Neo the red pill and the blue pill and Neo took the red pill, you said to yourself, he's right baby, you better believe he's right. I know, cuz I took the red pill myself, and yessiree Bob, the rabbit hole goes deep….

Imagine, incubating your children in a dark cavernous mindfarm where their curiosity and ambition are snuffed out for the purpose of nourishing some bulbous impersonal machine.

Most people, after 13 to 17 years in the educational meat grinder, are firmly convinced that 5% of their class is an elite group that's superior to everyone else, and the rest of us are doomed to fight over the scraps. Life on the wrong side of the 80/20 tracks. That's Just The Way It Is, mourns the Bruce Hornsby song.

I don't look at it that way. It's a lie.

This is how it really is:

If you apply ANY test to ANY group of people, it's gonna shake down to 80/20. Doesn't matter if it's history or math or Pokemon or soccer or belly dancing or model trains, 20% of the people have 80% of the capability.

But the top girl in math is rarely the top girl in belly dancing and the top soccer player is rarely the #1 guy in Pokemon.

When people are empowered to pursue their own uniqueness, almost all of them are a genius at something.

So the most important thing your kid can know is: He has the potential to be a genius at something. He needs to believe he's got something special inside.

Here's what I believe:

There are 6 billion people in the world and every single one is a diamond in some stage of being polished. Life is either going to polish you up or grind you down. And the difference between the two lies in how much hope you have, how much faith you have in the fact that you do carry something special on the inside, that's waiting to get out. Many give up, not knowing they were only 10 minutes from triumph.

Your job, should you choose to accept it, is to discover your uniqueness.

The other day we got an email from a guy who'd read a recent Renaissance Club members newsletter which was describing how mediocre most businesses and employees are.

He said, "I'm in the bottom 60% of my industry and in all honesty, I think 40% of the vendors in my industry do better work than me and provide a better service than me. So why should I market myself? All I'll be doing is spreading around more mediocrity."

He went on to say he didn't think he could be good at anything.

How sad. The antidote to mediocrity is inspiration. If he can't do that business with excellence, surely there is SOME business he can do with excellence. Yes, he should find something he CAN do well. There is always something. Who taught him that he's got no choice but to be a member of the bottom 60%? He didn't get that from me, that's for sure.

One more thing:

There's a set of elitist snobs who would like us to believe the world is overpopulated. There's not enough water, not enough food, not enough air, not enough land. All those useless homo sapiens, taking up too much space in the biosphere.

Of course I don't see any of those elitist snobs volunteering to move themselves out of the way.

There's an entire media machine that only tells you the bad news, neglects to tell you the good news, and fills your head with traumas that have no relevance to your life what-so-ever.

They do that because they like to manipulate people, and fearful, hopeless droids are a lot easier to manipulate than leaders who know where they're going.

Here's what I believe:

I believe there's always enough water, always enough food, always enough air, always enough land. The real resource is ingenuity and ingenuity comes from people. Have you ever considered… the world might actually be 'overcrowded' because there's not enough people?

Not enough geniuses. Not enough problem solvers. Not enough innovators and inventors. Not enough coal being polished into diamond.

PREDICTION: By the time the world has 10 billion people, a handful of geniuses will have been born by then who in turn will have figured out how to feed 12 billion people. There'll be enough food left over for 2 billion.

Time to go make some more geniuses. Hey mom and dad, why doncha pull yourselves away from your computer for a few minutes and get busy? You might enjoy the break from the usual routine.

OK, so anyway, here you are running your online business. Doing whatever it is that you do.

And you wonder, what is THE formula? What is THE secret?

There is no "THE" formula. There is no "THE" secret.

There is only YOUR formula, YOUR secret. YOUR Unique Selling Proposition. Which is your singular collection of talents and passions and ways to contribute to our burgeoninng planet of under-utilized geniuses.

For some people reading this blog post, I have a major role to play. For some people, the skills I teach are the exact skills you need to learn and the best thing you could do is buy every product and join coaching program I've got.

If everything you've bought from me so far has helped you, maybe you're one of those people.

For others, I'm just one voice along the way who sent them forward with a little encouragement and inspiration. And a little more mojo to go find THEIR right path to success.

If whatever you've bought from me so far has been off the mark, maybe I'm not the right guy for you. I send you on to greener pastures with a blessing.

Whichever person you are, I want you to remember every single day of your life that you've got skills, inclinations, aspirations, sparks of genius inside. Only YOU can do the things that YOU are destined to do.

Never let some elitist snob keep you from doing 'em.

Perry Marshall

P.S.: I wrote a very popular article called "Escaping The Institutional Straitjacket." If you're an elitist snob, it will offend you. If you're a scrapping entrepreneur like me, you just might think it's a kick.