Escape Velocity, Gravity, and Focus

Ever notice, as an internet entrepreneur, the temptation to diversify your focus into a multitude of markets, partnerships, joint ventures, sources of traffic, conversion methods, and marketing techniques  is seemingly irresistible?

I think there are MANY factors driving this rather neurotic tendency we all seem to struggle with (including, and perhaps especially, yours truly!)…

• Traffic sources are inherently unstable.   Google’s always changing the rules for both Adwords and SEO.  Social Media is a wild new animal hardly anyone really understands yet.   The email landscape is  subject to various laws, filters, and conventions (people have been crying “email marketing is dead” since I first started studying internet marketing back in 1998),  there are constant mergers and acquisitions, talk about taxes and online restrictions, FTC regulations, etc.
• A Tremendous Number of Skills Are Required to Succeed:   Research, copywriting, pay per click, blogging, systems development, market evaluation, human resources, management, legal, communications, emotional marketing and imagery, time management, accounting, html, javascript, blogging (you can outsource these last three  - oh yeah, you gotta know how to outsource well too)… I could go on and on.     The point is, NOBODY really is strong at all of these, so we’re all constantly searching for partners, JVs, and vendors to fill in the gaps
• Dreaming is a LOT More Fun Than Doing:   Setting up a marketing system (and the business to support it) is a lot of WORK.  It’s a lot more fun to consume the latest marketing package than to EXECUTE the latest marketing package.     (I still remember when this hit me.  In the midst of near bankruptcy back in 2003, I LOVED nothing better than to fill up my MP3 player with PPC and Copywriting gurus and just go walk in the mountains all day long.   It’s GREAT that I did this… I wouldn’t know what I know at this time if I hadn’t.  But the point is, we all need to ensure we’re “dreaming to live” and NOT “living to dream”)
• We Live With Constant Disappointment:  Because it’s rare that people thoroughly do their research and cash flow projections for a project… and then put in the necessary time, effort, and resources against a very realistically estimated growth curve, what happens to most entrepreneurs can only be described as episodic mania followed by severe disappointment (and depression).   It’s only human nature to run to the NEXT project dream when this happens.

Now, I’ve been fond of telling people “it takes 85% of a rocket’s fuel to achieve ‘escape velocity’ and get into outer space… the rest of the ride to the moon is mostly coasting and steering.”  I say that in order to assuage people’s anxiety, and to help motivate them through the “hump” required to get their projects off the ground.

But suddenly it hit me…

If it takes 85% of your fuel to get off the ground, then trying to launch four rockets at the same time is a losing game.  You simply can’t put 25% of your fuel into each rocket and expect it to do anything but fall back under the weight of the Earth’s gravity.

So, DESPITE the fears, insecurities, and constantly changing landscape of the internet, or perhaps BECAUSE of them, the spoils really go to those with persistence, fortitude, and FOCUS!

If you’re a member of Glenn Club, you know how psychotically I focus on choosing the right keyword conversation for your market, so YOU can narrow down your focus to exactly the right competitors, do exactly the right survey and interview research, and really dominate that keyword space.

But I’m talking about something way beyond your keyword space, I’m talking about your whole business.

What’s the single most important project in your business?  Are you focusing 85% of your resources on it?

Something worth thinking about, don’t you think?

Dr. G

Getten U Eeena Ze Club |   Coaching |   Beginners |   Outsourcing Webinar Replay

Facebook cheers up nursing homes

Yesterday I heard from a very reliable source that Facebook has triggered a sea change in the nursing home industry. This comes from a client of one of my business mentors.

The #1 reason people die is their friends have died or been dispersed to the four winds; their family doesn’t visit them anymore, and they have no more reason to get up in the morning. I’m sure all of us have visited long-term care facilities and seen the blank stares and hopelessness of aged people living out their last days.

Facebook has changed that. There are many, many 77 year old folks in nursing homes who now have 60 Facebook friends and interact with them on an hourly basis. This is literally extending life spans – to the point of wreaking havoc in the long-term care industry.

This is because many of the payment models are based on people living only so long and their communities on Facebook are literally extending their lives.

(It’s also creating some interesting social gaffes. Like after a person dies, their friends are still getting reminders: “You haven’t reached out to Ethel for awhile. Send her a note. Click here to POKE Ethel.”)

It’s also obliterating illiteracy. Kids might be able to fake reading books in school, but they can’t fake writing comments on their friends’ pages. I seriously believe that within 5 years, nearly every single kid in the developed world will be able to read, write and type – because of Facebook.

Within 10 years, the same will be true in developing countries – because of mobile phones. Yesterday I saw a video of men with pickaxes in Rwanda digging 6 foot trenches for fiber optic cable. Rwanda is rapidly becoming the most wired country in Africa.

To hard-core, driven business types, Facebook might seem like a toy. That’s what most people thought about the Internet 10-12 years ago. It turned out to be something much bigger than that, didn’t it?

I don’t know if Facebook is a perfect fit for your business or not, but if you haven’t taken our self-evaluation you might want to do that right now. It literally takes 60 seconds and you can do it at www.IsFacebookForMe.com.

Perry Marshall

Why Fancy Often Fails

When I was getting started in marketing, my favorite part was all the “unbelievably cool super flashy” stuff that I saw the masters do. Riveting headlines, ballsy copy, daring offers.

The problem was, when I tried to do the same thing with my customers it just didn’t sound right. It was almost like trying to stick a rock music drum solo in the middle of a country music song.

One of my fave rave UK musicians is Gavin Harrison. He’s the extraordinarily talented drummer for Porcupine Tree and on this video he talks about the rivalry between “technique” and real art. And how sometimes you don’t have to try nearly so hard to pull of something that’s really beautiful and effective:

Gavin’s ideas translate *exactly* to marketing, and to cultivating relationships with customers. In my London UK seminar in September, I’m going to focus on how you can accomplish more in less time by being more relaxed. By being less technique focused not more.

Marketing Technique-itus

There’s something driving me nucking futz today, and I hope you’ll excuse my ranting to my list because my wife is tired of hearing about it, and my dogs just look at me like I’m an idiot.

(“No Dad, PLEASE… not the ‘Technique-itus’
talk again, anything but that!”)

What’s irritating me is something called “Technique-itus”,  which is the technical term we psychologists use for a psychotic obsession with new marketing techniques.

Can I ask you a question?  How many people do you know… and I mean REAL people, not someone on stage at an internet seminar, who’ve built sustainable businesses based on the latest shiny object bouncing across the IM product launch world?

Do you even know ONE?

Now, let me ask you another question … how many broken hearted people do you know who spent money they couldn’t afford on an ill-fated dream they thought this technique or that would finally put together for them?

(I bet that’s a much bigger number)

Here’s what I keep coming back to, and it’s actually something Perry Marshall taught me…

You need ONE way of generating traffic, and ONE way of converting those people into buyers.

When you get good at that, you can let everyone else worry about all the other methods and just pay a really, really good affiliate commission.  You can even do this for the other parts of business you’re not good at.

For example, I’m so good at PPC for traffic, and Market Research for conversion, that I not only let affiliates handle all my web 2.0 stuff and SEO, I was also able to attract a partner to run a whole company for me  (Rocket Clicks).

I’m really not saying this to brag. (Except sometimes I AM an idiot and I do brag … but que sera’ sera’)

I’m saying it to FOCUS you on the real question at hand which is …

Do YOU know what your MAGIC TWO are?

More importantly, what’s it going to take to cure your Technique-itus and get you to focus on THOSE?

Damn … I’d probably better stop getting so much gratification from writing these posts and get back to selling stuff by presenting benefit after benefit, etc.

But it’s really cool to have 30,000+ people who really pay attention to what you’ve got to say… I guess sometimes I abuse that priveledge.   But please don’t complain to me… you can just write my wife supportive letters.

And honestly, this IS an important message given where we all are in the world now, don’t you think?  Who among us can afford to be chasing shiny bouncing balls TODAY?

Hope I made you think. (That’s my job)

Dr. G

Fred in Accounting: Genius or Idiot?

Us marketers have a real interesting relationship with bean counters: We use them the wrong way. In 2 areas:

(1) We FAIL to have bean counters tell us how much money our promotions and sales funnels are making for us. Seriously, most of us don’t have any “cost accounting” on our advertising and product sales at all. We shoot from the hip. Dumb.

(2) We let our bean counters scrutinize our reps, distributors and affiliates. “Hey wait a minute, I don’t really think you have to keep paying Jeff for that customer you brought him last year.” We amputate a critical piece of our sales channel and we kill the goose that lays the golden egg.

That’s backwards. It happens, by the way, because the cost accounting of #2 is a whole lot easier to perform than #1. Accountants are notoriously shortsighted about marketing and business strategy anyway.

Here’s how it should be:

(1) Our bean counters should be telling us, in dollars and cents, how much those promotions are earning. Most of us have products we should get rid of. (Myself included! As soon as I’m done with this email I’m gonna go fix this.)

(2) Our bean counters should not be allowed to make personal staff and sales channel decisions. They don’t understand the nature of the relationship.

Let’s get this right. Again, I’m guilty of this myself. Gonna change this.

Robert Serling created a document called The 8 Questions and one of my favorite sections is called “Meet the Captain of Your Ship – Fred in Accounting.”

There’s some real gold here and I think you’ll benefit from these 8 questions:

http://profitalchemy.com/the8questions/

Perry Marshall