Archive | August, 2020

This won’t make you rich, but it can pay the bills. Basically, you’re going to hire two outsourcers and then sell the websites they build for you. This has been done by at least one marketer that I know personally, and I’m sure many others have found similar success with this business model. Here are the details…

Hire two outsourcers, possibly from the Philippines or anywhere you can get excellent full time help for about $500 each per month.

One outsourcer should be versed in all phases of website building and PhotoShop. Things they will need to do: Install WordPress sites, install plugins, install autoresponder forms, use Photoshop to create website graphics as needed, etc.

The second outsourcer is a good writer, preferably a VERY good writer, able to research and write about most any topic.

This is your team.

One thing to know – work expands to fill the time allotted. So if you give your team two weeks to build a site, that’s how long it will take. Instead, see if they can do it in 2 days.

For what you want done, it should only take 2 days. In fact, for the website builder it should only take one day, and two days for the writing.

Now then, the first site your team is going to build will be for you. It should be an authority blog, containing several posts and an embedded YouTube video or two.

You choose the domain name, let them know what you’re looking for, then let them sort out everything else.

This is going to be your example website. Of course, you can continue to build this site out over time, making it a true authority site. And you can use the outsourcers to do this for you. But first and foremost, you want to treat it as your example website.

Now you launch an offer to build authority websites for other people in the niches of their choosing. You can start by notifying your list of your new service, place in the top marketing forums and branch out to Facebook after that.

Charge whatever you like – $300 is a good price but it’s up to you.

The website will be a unique authority blog in whatever niche they choose, with perhaps 5 posts already written, all the plugins in place, basic SEO, a domain of its own… you get the idea.

You’re paying your team $1,000 a month, so you need to make 4 sales to be in profit.

But realistically your team can build 10 sites a month, spending 2 days on each site and working 5 days a week.

10 sales at $300 is $3,000, minus the $1,000 you pay your team leaves you with a $2,000 profit.

Of course, you can charge more, offer different packages and so forth. For example, your deluxe package might contain 15 posts and cost $700, depending on how good your team is and how well you do at selling the sites.

If you find your team has downtime between orders, you can have them create a product for you, or build sites which you then sell pre-made.

There is some work in getting the sales and communicating the desires of the client to your workers. But it shouldn’t take you more than an hour a day to accomplish this.

And once your other ventures are making enough money that you don’t want to be bothered with this endeavor anymore, you can always sell it as a turnkey business. Sweet success!

Short and sweet: Are you going wide instead of deep? For example, if you’re in online marketing, are you trying to reach every new marketer out there? This is a huge mistake.

If your niche is gardening, are you trying to reach every vegetable gardener on the planet?

And if your niche is dating, are you targeting every single male – period?

Then you’re going too wide. By appealing to everyone, you appeal to no one.

I once coached a woman who wanted to start a newsletter for parents.

All parents.

Of every age of child, 0-18, who lived anywhere on the planet.

I spent half the coaching session trying to talk her out of this strategy, or rather, lack of strategy.

She could not be dissuaded.

And I never heard from her or her newsletter again. My guess is she’s still stuck working the 9-5 job she was trying so hard to leave.

What should she have done?

Targeted brand new first time parents, or parents of 0-2 year old children, or middle class working parents of annoying teenagers, or adoptive parents, or frustrated foster parents, or…

…you get the idea.

Broad niches will keep you broke and frustrated.

Narrow niches can make you rich.

It’s that simple.

You have to admit – the online world is CROWDED with marketing messages. It’s hard to start out and get noticed, and it’s becoming more difficult every day. Ironically, some of the older methods have once again become more effective. As everyone else vies for attention online, consider doing something old school, such as…

Sending Postcards

When you send an email, it’s easily ignored or deleted. A message on social media carries even less weight.

But a real life, physical piece of mail that lands in a prospect’s mailbox is something they will take notice of. And postcards are cheaper to mail than letters.

Here’s what to do: Decide on the goal of your postcard – do you want them to join your list? Attend your webinar event? Go to a sales page?

Once you have your goal, use testing to find just the right slant for your offer. A postcard is a relatively small space, so every word and every image has got to pull its own weight. But once you find the magic mailing piece, you can continue to mail it out for months and even years, as long as it remains effective.

Know the lifetime value of your customer. This will help you determine what kind of conversion rate you need with your postcard mailers to be in profit.

Send the postcards yourself, or use a postcard mailing service.

Simply Google “postcard mailing service” and you’ll find a company to match your needs.

Sending Lumpy Mail

What’s the best way to get your mailing piece to stand out? Make it lumpy.

If you’ve ever received a non-profit solicitation for a donation, you probably know what we’re talking about. They send pennies, pens, calendars, packs of greeting cards and all sorts of things to get you to open their envelope. And of course once you have their free gift, the law of reciprocity kicks in and you want to send them something back.

For our purposes, think of something unusual and cost effective, such as…

– A pebble (because of the rocky time they’ve had, or the rocky time ahead if they don’t get your product)

– Seed packets (to ‘grow’ their business, grow their profits, etc.)

– A compass (so they can find their way)

– A thumb drive loaded with your value-offering promotional materials

– Worry stones (because they’re up at night, worrying about their business or how to pay the bills)

– Poker chips (because they shouldn’t gamble on other products or providers)

– Aspirin in a packet to ease their pain

– A paper wallet because you’ll show them how to fill it with money

– A sand timer for when they’re running out of time

– And so forth.

Again, there are services to help you accomplish this. For example, www.gcfrog.com/lumpymail/ is a good starting point.

Print Ads

The trick here is to make your ad look like an article in the magazine or newspaper you’re advertising in. Let’s say you’re advertising in a magazine – get an issue and see how their articles are formatted. Two columns? Three? What font do they use? What about picture placement?

Write your ad as more of an advertorial than a regular ad. You might have to put the words, “Paid advertisement” at the top of your ad, but it will still convert better than if your ad looks like an ad.

Have a great headline and use lots of sub-headlines to keep the reader on the page.

Have a strong call to action for an irresistible offer. The offer should be so good people simply cannot resist it, whatever it is.

Get a Local Column

This is an excellent technique for local business consultants. If you live in a small to medium sized city, your local newspaper might be thrilled if you would volunteer your services to write them a column each week on a topic that interests their readers.

If not, you might consider taking out a weekly ad and making it look like a column. In some respects, this is actually preferable to writing the column for free, since you’ll have more control over your topics.

Be very helpful in what you write. Only the last line or two should promote your business. The bulk of your column should be helpful information that people can use.

This will set you up as the authority and the person people turn to when they need your services.

Birthday Cards

Here’s something that used to be common and no longer is, which is why it will make you stand out from the crowd of marketers like a beacon on a hill. Send REAL birthday cards through the mail to your best customers.

You might collect their birthday (Month and day, not year) when they check out. You might even tell them WHY you’re collecting it. Let them know it’s optional, but you’d really like to remember them on their birthday.

Most people will be eager to share their birthdate with you. Or you can hop on Facebook and discover their birthday there if they have it listed.

If you don’t want to send the cards yourself, use a service such as postable.com or sendoutcards.com.

Now then – a person might interact with a few hundred people and companies online over the course of a year. But odds are you will be the only one who remembers their birthday. That makes you pretty special.

You might include an offer of a free birthday gift in your card, too. Perhaps a video you recorded for their birthday (you can use the same one for everyone) and a download link for a free product. Guaranteed they will be opening your emails and following you closely on social media after that.

When it comes to things like investing and marketing, doing the opposite of what most people are doing is often the winning course. Now that everyone else is online, be sure to look for offline opportunities to win the hearts, minds and wallets of your customers.