A 3-step antidote to entrepreneurial ADD

Dave is quitting his day job in six months’ time.

He’s been quitting his day job in six months’ time for the past four years.

He’s never short of ideas, Dave.

And he’s always on the look out for the newest trend in the market. He knows where the next big wave is going to be and he’s sure to be riding it.

But then he spots another wave.

The new wave is as absolute beauty. It’s even bigger than the last one. He can’t miss this. Not this one. Man, he’d kick himself if he missed this.

And so goes the cycle.

The constant search for the newest biggest wave. The distraction of the shinier shiny thing. Entrepreneurial ADD.

In these modern times – the age of the internet – entrepreunerial ADD is more of a problem than ever.

Why?

Because the barrier of entry to any market now is so low.

Anyone can put up a website in a couple of days, for practically nothing, and be in business.

So what’s the antidote?

The antidote is a plan.

And a sober commitment to that plan. No more messing around.

The steps you take might look something like this…

1. Find a market.

Find a market that you can be really passionate about.

Find an area of that market (or niche) with:

• high demand (lots of people want what you’re offering)
• low competition (few other business are offering it and offering it well)

More on this? Try here, here, and here.

2. Figure out what you need to do to be the best in that market

Work out who your customers really are and what they really want.

More on this? Try here and here.

Spy on your competition. Find out exactly what they’re doing. Copy the best bits and improve on them.

If they’re online then this bit is easy. You can:

• Subscribe to their newsletter / auto-responder sequence.
• Analyse their keywords, back links etc. using an SEO analysis tool
• Join their affiliate program and ask loads of questions

When you’ve done all this then you should have an excellent idea of how to build a better business.

3. Do that stuff. And keep doing it.

You now have a sober plan of what you need to do to appeal to your customers and dominate your competition.

All you need to do now is to start doing it.

And carry on doing it until you start making a profit.

I think that Dave would quit his job in six months’ time if he followed this plan.

What do you think?

Love JJ

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Do you know what questions your customers want answered?

Hey there!

I’m always banging on about how important it is to identify with the needs, pains and desires of your prospective customers, so that you can provide the solutions they want.

(Check out this article for some wonderfully practical advice on this.)

One of the very best ways to do this is to find out what questions your prospective customer is asking.

And the one of the easiest ways to do that is to find out what questions your customer is typing into the internet search engines.

You see, people often type complete questions into search engines.

If you can identify these questions and then answer them then you can make all your customers’ dreams come true. And – as a bonus – you’ll be able to help yourself to a nice big slice of the search engine traffic pie.

(A tasty pie, indeed.)

So how do you find out what questions they’re asking?

Well… The eggheads at Wordtracker have just released a free keyword questions tool, which looks to me to be a rather wonderful little thing. You can find it at http://labs.wordtracker.com/keyword-questions/

You enter a one or two word keyword phrase, the tool “pairs it with pair it with six question words – what, why, when, how, where and who – and then conduct[s] a broad match from” [1] a database of a years worth of search terms.

I typed in the phrase life coach and got the results below:

Cool, eh?

The value in the Times Asked column should be treated as strictly indicative. It tells you the number of times that search term appears in the Wordtracker database in the last 140 days.

This doesn’t really mean anything in the real world, as this database holds only a sample of the total searches made. So you should not treat these results as absolute but, rather, use them as the basis for further research.

For a better idea of true search volumes, you could type these questions into the Google AdWords Keyword Tool. (We discuss more about this here.)

What are you going to do with these questions?

Now you’ve identified the best and most relevant questions your customers are asking. Which is an admirable thing in itself.

But what specific actions are you going to take on this knowledge?

You might:

• Create a webpage or blog post answering each one of the questions you’ve identified
• Create a product to sell which is targeted specifically to answering one or more of these questions
• Address these questions in your existing sales copy
• Make an appearance on Oprah with the name of your website tattooed on your forehead and talk about the answers to these questions.

Oh yeah.

Remember… market research can be fun!

Love, JJ.

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[1] http://www.wordtracker.com/academy/keyword-questions-tool

A new lick of paint!

How does it look in here?!

Pretty, isn’t it?

I’ve done a little bit of rebranding and a complete website redesign.

I hope the new website is cleaner, more fun and easier to find your way around. There are a few loose edges to tidy up but I’m going to let you have a play with it. Please let me know what you think.

So what was the thinking behind this redesign?

Well… I wanted the look and feel to be more consistent with the Jalopy brand essence.

But more importantly I wanted to:

• reduce the chance of confusion
• have a single, clear, highly conspicuous call to action. (Can you tell what it is?!)

As always, your feedback is very much appreciated!

Love JJ.

If it all starts to look a little bit funny around here…

Hey there!

I’m going to be giving this place a lick of virtual paint over the next couple of days.

So if the site starts acting up a bit then please relax, laugh, go and make a cup of tea, hug the dog, take a nap and rest assured that it’s all going to look super shiny awesome when you come back!

We’re bound to get a little bit of paint on the carpet…

See you soon in a brand new shiny Jalopyland!

JJ.

Get Over Yourself! It’s not about you.

I have a secret…

Most of your customers, even your most loyal ones, don’t care how hard you work, how much you want to help them, or how cool, funny or successful you are.

They care about themselves.

They care about making their pain go away. They care about feeling good, being entertained, feeling successful, feeling superior, feeling clever.

As entrepreneurs, you and I sometimes focus on what makes us look and feel good, rather than what makes our customers feel the same way.

And that’s a costly mistake.

It’s about them, not you.

So get over yourself!

JJ Jalopy.

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Introduction to Affiliate Marketing. (Or how affiliate checks can keep your wine cabinet stocked this year.)

You may have heard that affiliate marketing is a good way to make money on the internet.

And you might fancy well fancy a bit of the affiliate marketing money pie yourself.

After all, it’s not cheap to keep your shoe cupboard overstocked and the children’s margarita habits satisfied.

So what is Affiliate Marketing? Give me an introduction please.

Okay. Thanks for asking.

In affiliate marketing, a business with something to sell, rewards one or more affiliates for each each customer (or visitor) brought about by the affiliate marketer’s marketers efforts.

So basically you, the affiliate marketing dude(tte), get rewarded for marketing someone else’s stuff.

The seller puts all the effort into producing something awesome. Now he wants to sell it to as many people as possible. Because of this, he is prepared to share the money he gets from the sale of the item with you if you can find him some customers.

For downloadable products with negligible distribution costs the seller is often prepared to share 50% of the cost of the item with you, sometimes more. And all you had to do was find someone who wants to buy it.

Cool, eh?

So how I do affiliate marketing effectively?

Well, let’s have a think about the actions that might lead a person to purchase a given product.

Let’s assume that our prospective customer is either:

• ready to buy from a preselected manufacturer, retailer or authority figure
• looking for more information on a product or service
• looking for information to help them solve a problem.

Let’s think about your prospective customer, as he sits in front of his computer, ready to search.

Scenario 1 – Dave has already decided on the product he’s going to buy.

Dave has heard great things about Kevin Hogan and his Secrets of Reading Body Language Home Study Course. He’s a subscriber to Kevin’s newsletter Coffee with Kevin Hogan, and he digs Kevin’s no-nonsense approach to life and work. He learns a ton from Kevin’s newsletter and he trusts and appreciates the Kevin Hogan brand.

Dave is likely to go directly to Kevin’s website, or take a link from Kevin’s newsletters, maybe with a discount coupon code. He’ll buy the Course directly from the source that he trusts.

Is there any way that you could persuade Dave to buy the course through your website, rather than directly from Kevin?

Well it’s not likely, because Dave isn’t looking for anyone else.

Your best chance in this scenario would be to buy prominent advertising on keywords similar to the one’s Kevin uses to promote the product, or to offer compelling extra bonuses or rebates to tempt Dave to buy through you – effectively reducing your margin on sale.

Neither of these options are likely to do very well because you are competing directly with Kevin, who is an established and trusted authority figure. And Dave isn’t looking for you anyway.

Oh well.

Scenario 2 – Marie is looking to buy a certain type of product, but doesn’t know which one.

Marie had a great conversation with her friends last night about body language. She becomes fascinated by the subject. Her friend John tells her that he took a great weekend course on body language and it helped him to improve his personal and business relationships enormously.

Marie goes online to search for body language courses in her local area of Wichita, Kansas.

Is there a possibility that Marie could buy the Kevin Hogan home study course through your website?

Well, yes. But you will need to be the answer to the question that she was searching for.

Marie was looking for body language courses in Wichita. If you know something about that subject then maybe you can create a website that Marie will visit?

Maybe you’ll have a website with reviews and listings of different courses around the U.S. or within Kansas. On that website you’ll could also have a review of Kevin’s Home Study course, or a relevant sales letter. Marie might decide that, although she was looking for local weekend courses, she quite likes the idea of being able to study at home. And if she buys the course you make a share of the profit.

In this scenario you have created a niche market - people looking for local weekend courses.

If you concentrate your efforts in building a resource rich website in this area, or buy advertising in this niche area then we can attract visitors and sell some copies of the course.

It’s not a great niche, because there is little emotion associated with the common problems and passions of the group. But it’s a step forward from Scenario 2.

Scenario 3 – Susan is pissed that her husband cheated on her.

Susan’s husband cheated on her last year.

She’s hurt and she wants to be sure this doesn’t happen again.

She goes online and searches for information on how to be sure she is never lied to again.

In this scenario, is there a possibility that Marie could wind up buying the Kevin Hogan home study course through your website?

Of course. But, just like before, you need to be the answer to the question that Susan is asking.

Maybe you have a website with articles and advice targeted at married women trying to deal with their husband’s infidelity. Maybe you have a specific page dedicated to reading body language to ensure that you are never lied to again. Maybe this page will contain a summary of your experiences with the Home Study Course and a link to purchase it.

It doesn’t really matter. What matters is that we have defined a niche. And in concentrating on that niche, you have been able to provide the answer to the question Susan is looking for. Once you have her attention you can then offer her the chance to buy the course from you.

This niche is probably going to be more profitable to you than the previous one because there is a large amount of emotion associated with the common problem the group experiences.

Do you see how this works?

Good. So, how do you decide what affiliate product to promote, and how are you going to decide what niche to target?

I would start with thinking about your own personal experience. Is there a product you have bought recently that you have had a lot of value from? Ask yourself the following questions:

• Why did you buy the product?
• What in particular benefits did you get from the product?
• What kind of people do you most identify with?
• How could the product benefit your friends?

It can be a great approach if you have personally received a lot of value from the product and have a clear idea of an accessible group who could obtain similar value from it.

Good luck! And let me know how you get on.

See you later dude.

JJ Jalopy.

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