Archive | May, 2021

On a whim I opened my spam folder today to see if I’ve been missing anything. The answer is I’ve missed a LOT. Here are some of the highlights…

1: Text to Speech Videos are Annoying

Not all spam is spam. Sometimes someone you recognize turns up in your spam folder. In this email I clicked the link to the video he recommended about “What So-in-so taught Such-in-such About Success.”

The video was only 2 1/2 minutes long but I couldn’t make it past the first 30 seconds. Stock photography slides and text to speech software made it unbearable to watch. If he had used a real voice to narrate the video, I likely would have stayed to the end.

2: You Can Buy an Award from a Well-Known Magazine

I am soooo tempted to tell you the name of this business magazine, but let’s just say that you almost certainly have heard of it. In this email they are giving helpful instructions on how to apply for their Best in Business Awards.

You can choose from 37 (yes, THIRTY-SEVEN) different industry categories in 3 different company stage categories and 3 different company size categories. You can apply to as many categories as you like, and each application costs you just $345 dollars. Oh yes, and they will be choosing multiple winners in each category, so your odds of winning something are pretty good. In fact, I suspect EVERYONE wins.

I took a look at the application – at 3 pages long it’s not exactly extensive or comprehensive. Something tells me they are far more interested in collecting application fees than finding the Best Businesses. And yet any company that buys wins one of these awards will be able to flaunt it for recognition, brand exposure and credibility purposes.

Yes, I know this has probably been happening for decades and maybe I’ve been a little naïve, but somehow I’ve thought these awards were supposed to MEAN something.

3: I Won a Free Lottery Ticket

Yeah. Right…

4: Some Marketers Think I Don’t Have a Life

I’ve noticed that some (many?) marketers vastly overestimate my attention span, free time and interest in watching their sales video. I’m reminded of a Mark Twain quote:

Marketers: take the time to remove the drivel and fluff and sharpen your message into something I WANT to watch or read. Please.

Here’s the email that caught my attention: “We’re about to start the LIVE training where you’ll see first-hand how you can tap into email lists of 150 MILLION consumers and target any offer you wish.”

Yes, I know it sounds too good to be true, but I was curious, so I clicked the link.

What I found was a headline and a recorded presentation 2 hours and 40 minutes long. Nothing else. No bullet points to entice me to watch the confounded video. No copy to tell me why I need or want to invest nearly 3 hours watching this behemoth. Just a counter telling me I had 7 days, 10 hours and 51 minutes to… do something. I’m not sure what.

If you want me to watch your sales video then you’d better give me some great reasons WHY I want to watch it. Tell me what I’m going to learn in the video, what benefits I’m going to get even if I don’t take your offer, and yes, tell me there will be an offer, too. Even though I already know that, I like you to come clean about it up front because then I can start to believe the other things you’ve told me, too.

And another thing – I GUARANTEE that no recorded sales video needs to be 2 hours and 40 minutes long. Cut the beginning introductory B.S., get right into the meat, give me 3 to 10 awesome how-to’s that I can immediately use and then make your offer. Tell me up front what I’ll discover in your video, make it enticing, keep the video to 60 minutes or less and I promise that unless my house is on fire, I’ll watch it.

5: Turning Affirmations into Questions can Speed Your Success

This is something I already knew but I appreciate the reminder.

When you say, “I am thin and healthy,” your mind naturally argues with your affirmations like this: “That’s a lie! I’m fat and sick and I know it!”

Instead of making statements, ask yourself questions such as, “Why is it so easy for me to be thin and healthy?” When you ask the question, your mind works with you to find the answers. “Because I eat small portions and I take walks every day!”

6: Bootcamps Are Still Awesomely Profitable

Okay, I’ll admit up front that this email was poorly written but it still got the message across.

Essentially a big name – a VERY big name – in marketing was giving a bootcamp that was starting TODAY. The big name would kick off the event and then hand it over to others to perform the actual teaching. Smart. His name sells the event but he’s no longer having to do the work himself.

Attendees would not only learn what they need to do to vastly improve their marketing systems; they would also be DOING the work during the virtual bootcamp.

This is awesome for a couple of reasons. First, the attendees will immediately have something to show for their money, making it much easier to upsell them to something higher priced later. Second, you don’t need nearly as much content for your bootcamp. If half of your time is spent letting the participants do work, that’s time when you don’t have to be teaching.

I suspect their goal here is to give a taste of their big and expensive marketing/coaching program to their best prospects – people who have already spent $197 for this bootcamp. I’ll bet they close 30-50% of them on upgrading (just an educated guess).

The first bonus takes no extra work for them because it’s recordings of the live event. The second bonus is a monthly live Q and A, the perfect place to gently upsell those who didn’t buy into the expensive program at the end of bootcamp.

Please notice what happened here: Reading a single email in my spam folder reminded me (and maybe you, too) of an entire business model that is super easy to implement and highly profitable, too.

7: This Marketing Guru’s Email Account Got Hijacked

I can’t name names here, but a certain marketer’s account apparently got hijacked. (Either that or he’s entered the sex trade industry.) While his emails used to be all about getting traffic, making online sales and so forth, now his emails are offering me dates, sex and… well, you can use your imagination for the rest.

The thing is, this didn’t go on for just a day or two. It continued for two WEEKS. I cannot imagine the damage this has done to his brand. Personally, I can tell you that while his emails used to land in my inbox with no problem, they are now all in my spam folder, even though he has gone back to talking about internet marketing.

Folks, you might want to protect your email accounts like your business depends on it. Because it does.

8: I Won More Lottery Tickets

In fact, I won over a dozen lottery tickets in the last 5 days alone. I had no idea I’m so lucky! Good thing I checked my spam folder.

9: Completely Over the Top (Sometimes) Works

Marketing messages aren’t about what we want to tell our prospects, but rather what our prospects want to hear from us.

In the interest of always learning, I subscribe to lists outside of my own interests and online marketing. Because what’s working in, say, dating might also work in another niche.

This email in my spam folder is selling a program to single women who want to find love. To me it’s completely over the top and borderline ridiculous, but I know it’s probably working because I get emails with this sort of language all the time.

I’ll paste a portion of it here:

“I’m about to show you a DANGEROUS text that you really only want to send to guy… …

if you are READY for him to fall head over heels for you like love-sick, high school crush.

Just one TEXT and even a guy who blew you off before can become obsessed and won’t have the willpower to stop himself from chasing you.

==>Discover it HERE

The text might appear a little silly at first…

But the reason it works is it pumps up a man’s adrenaline, urging him to keep chasing you over and over.

This will even work when he is currently obsessing over another woman…

Because it immediately awakens a fresh enthusiasm of DEEP LOVE for you that’ll make him completely forget other women.

And every bone in his body will be aching to earn your heart in ways you’ve only see in movies.

If you haven’t seen this yet then this is going to be a game changer for your relationship.

==>Dangerous Text – Are You Sure You Want Him To Chase You This Hard?

Putting aside the… ugh… language of the email, the basic message is this texting program is so incredibly effective that we need to warn you it might be TOO effective.

Imagine you’re selling a traffic program – “This program is so effective we have to warn you that your site might crash and customers who desperately want to buy your product might email you night and day until you sell it to them.”

If you’re selling a weight loss program – “We cannot warn you enough that this program is so effective, if you do not stay within the limits prescribed then you will lose weight TOO FAST and no one will recognize who you are, and security guards at your job may arrest you for impersonating, well… you.”

If you’re selling a gardening vegetable fertilizer – “Warning!! This is the one product that will pump up your pumpkins to the size of a house and make your neighbors get a restraining order on the 30 foot tall sunflowers blacking out their view of the sky.”

Ha! I love that last one.

10: How to Bring Everyone Back to You

An email from a favorite source – James Altucher – landed in my spam folder. In it he gives 11 pieces of advice, and here’s my favorite:

Make Everyone Else Look Good

I had a professor once who said he didn’t care if anyone knew who he was. I didn’t understand. He said, “If my students become famous, then I’ve done a good job.”

Make your boss look good. Make your spouse look good. Give all credit to your employees. If you are always the source of “credit” then everyone will come back to the source.

Strong people don’t put others down. They lift them up.

And that’s awesome advice I’m going to carry with me and use.

And now you know what I learned from snooping in my spam folder today. Have you checked yours lately?

Because competition is a real factor here, I’m not allowed to reveal the exact niche for this case study. Luckily, this method will work in any niche where you can save people money on something they’re already buying. And it will work in a lot of other niches, too, but for now let’s talk about the whole money saving deal.

For purposes of discussion, I’m going to change the niche to air travel, and we’ll assume it’s not during a pandemic.

This person – we’ll call him Vinnie – set up an information email list giving away free info on cheap flights. Again, I’ve changed the niche, but let’s roll with it. When airlines get cancellations, make mistakes and so forth, they sometimes offer crazy good deals just to get the seats filled. Vinnie keeps tabs of these offers and sends his list info that can save them a lot of money on their airline tickets.

But here’s where it gets good: While anyone can subscribe for free, he also has a paid version. The cost is low, about $40 for 3 months or $90 for a year. The savings on just one deal alone can be several hundred dollars, making it an easy sale to air travelers.

The difference between free and paid subscriptions is the free subscribers only get about one third of the deals in their inbox.

Paid subscribers get ALL the deals.

Here’s what’s great about this business model:

•   The content writes itself. All you would be doing is passing along the info that your readers want. Essentially it might sound something like, “Delta is offering 2 for 1 discounts for the next 24 hours for transatlantic flights. Here’s the link to their site.”

•   Readers can easily afford the subscription price. If they have the money for plane tickets, they can afford a $90 subscription.

•   Getting just one deal a year more than pays for the subscription. People who continue to fly do not unsubscribe.

•   Paid members get an ego bump because they have ‘inside knowledge’ they can brag about to others. “My guy saved me $400 on my ticket.”

•   It’s easy to get new subscribers. Since he has a free version and because people want to save money, his conversion rate on his squeeze page is extremely high.

•   Once free subscribers see how valuable the info is and realize they are missing two-thirds of it, upgrading is an easy sell.

He made $140,000 in just the first six months alone. He wouldn’t tell me how much he’s made since, but I do know he bought an expensive new house and he’s hired 3 people to handle most of the business for him.

One more thing: Once he realized how big this was going to become (and please remember, I have not revealed his true niche) he decided to bring on affiliates with a referral program. This made things explode and kept his competition to a minimum.

Here’s what you can do: Be on the lookout for any niche where people need quick, up to date info on something. It might not just be about saving money on a particular item. Maybe they need the latest news or methods in their niche such as investing and so forth.

When you find a good possibility, verify that people are paying money in the niche. Obviously, people pay for airline tickets so that would be easy. And some niches will surprise you. I’ve heard of a guy who is making a killing writing a monthly newsletter about collecting arrowheads. He works maybe 5 to 10 hours a month and pulls in $10,000 in monthly subscriptions in his one man operation.

Create a free version of your newsletter, find where your audience hangs out and get them signed up. Show them why it’s to their benefit to become an insider and upgrade to the paid version.

Learn your numbers and start advertising to scale the entire operation up. Vinnie advertises online and in publications.

Remember to sell your readers other stuff, too. If your niche is golf tips, sell them golf equipment and golf packages. If your niche is dog training, sell them high end dog food and so forth.

This is so simple, you can get started almost immediately, just as soon as you choose your profitable niche.

PLR or private label rights don’t always enjoy the best reputation. Most marketers figure PLR was written by someone who either doesn’t speak English well or has no background in the subject matter. Oftentimes the PLR is cobbled together with a lousy sales letter with amateur graphics and sold as a package to unsuspecting marketers.

Is that how you view PLR? If so, it’s no wonder. Many PLR packages aren’t worth the money which is why potential buyers are leery of new offers. But there is a way to still sell boatloads of PLR to marketers, and it works like this:

Before you sell PLR licenses, sell the product as it is. Launch the product on its own without rights. Sell it to your list, put it on JVZoo or wherever you want. Make no mention that you will be selling the PLR rights to it, not even as an upsell.

The idea is to let it stand on its own. Now it’s tried and tested, there is no question it sells, and it stands apart from every other PLR offer out there because it’s proven.

Wait a couple of weeks and then offer the rights to it. Often the people who purchased the product from you in the first place will be the first people to buy the rights, too, because they’ve seen the product and they value it.

If you want to sell the PLR licenses for a higher price, then simply restrict the number of people who can purchase a license. And you won’t need to convince anyone that your PLR is of great quality because it will already be a proven seller.