Marketing Strategy 101 How to Build an Impressive List Overnight!

Marketing strategies like list building requires planning, hard work and a strategy - However, the long-term benefits are tremendous!

I’ll tell you why I believe a customer or email list is important.  I’ve related this story once before, but it bears repeating.  I once worked a summer for an Internet marketer that was doing very well for himself. 

Wow, what an eye opener. 

(If you would like to read a more detailed account of that story, click on this link:  The Lessons I learned from an Internet Marketing Millionaire.)

One day, while I was working on his hundreds of websites, we got into a conversation about what made him so successful in his Internet marketing endeavors.

He basically told me what I had already heard a hundred times in other places, but it bears repeating.

The List is Gold!

“The money is in the list.  Your list is absolute gold.  If you learn one thing from me, remember, the list is gold!” (Emphasis added.)

So, I guess you could draw from that conversation that a list is kind of important.  I mean, when someone successful leaves a hint like that you might not want to ignore it.

You Need to Have a List Building Strategy

However, building a list is not easy.  Just like anything else in business, you have got to have a plan and then execute it.  This is probably going to be the most important part of your overall marketing plan, and you need to focus on working it daily.

In order to make this as simple as possible, we will take this step by step.  This will also help you implement this strategy as quickly as possible. 

Just keep in mind what Edison said, “The only place where success comes before work is in the dictionary.”

Step 1 Determine your target audience.  If you don’t know who your niche audience is, you’re going to have a very rough time writing messages or a series of emails to them that they can relate to.  Marketing to everyone is marketing to no one.

So, if you don’t have a niche market you’re targeting, then you need to sit down

Choose your target audience wisely!

and decide what niche you are going to operate in. If you have absolutely no idea how to do this, there are loads of resources on the Internet to help you do this research. 

Step 2 Determine your email marketing objectives.  Once you know, love and understand who your target market is, you can then decide what you’re going to do with your campaign.  Here are some questions that you may want to consider in your list building strategy:

• Do you want to just connect with an audience on a regular basis? 
• Are you going to raise awareness of your product and brand? 
• Are you going to dazzle your audience with your vast subject knowledge in an effort to be seen as an authority? 
• Or, are you merely going to sell your product or service to your audience right out of the starting gate?

These are questions you need to answer before you begin to actually build your list.  Once you have a plan for communicating with your prospects or audience, you will have a much easier time planning your email subjects and content.

Step 3 Set up a tracking system for your campaign.   Once you begin your email campaign, you’ll want to have a way to see how many people are opening your mail and how many of them are clicking on the links you are providing them. 

Most of the email services online will have features like this that are built in. The best ones are: AWeber, Constant Contact, and MailChimp.  These are the three I have used in the past, but of course, there are a slew of others out there. 

Tip:  In my opinion, I would go with a cheaper company initially so that I could learn the ropes of email marketing first.  Then, if you really stick with this strategy and move forward, you can then transfer your email addresses to a more high powered and expensive company. If you are starting your business the dirt-cheap method, you can always use a free auto responder for a while like SendFree.  

Once you have a mailing list that is starting to grow rather quickly, you can migrate your list over to a paid system.  SendFree doesn't have any tracking or other services with their free version, but you can always upgrade later, if you wish.

These services offer all sorts of tracking for email campaigns, especially Aweber, which is the premier email service on the Internet today.  However, you will probably pay more for these bells and whistles than you would with other companies.

Step 4 Build a worthy landing page.

In case you don’t know, a landing page is the page your readers will go to once they click your email link, ad link or link in a blog or website post.  One of the big mistake most people make is that they have people go to their home page. 

The page you should be sending them to should be the page that you reference in your email campaign, blog post or other link.  The landing page needs to be relevant to the email that you are sending the prospect or reader from.

If you send an email to a reader about a blog post that you've written, just make sure that the link you feed your readers goes to the relevant post you've written.

What is the purpose of your landing page?

Is the purpose of your landing page to get someone to buy a product?  Is it to just collect an email address?  Do you want people to download an app from your site?

Who is your audience?

This is a question that you should have answered well before this.  You need to know your niche market and how to cater to their needs.  You should know what type of lingo they are attracted to and how they are going to relate to your style of writing and marketing message. 

Where did my readers come from?

The best hedge against building a different page for each different place your prospects come from is to make sure your offer and email sign up are prominent on all of your pages. 

If you want to see a really good example of this take a look at the Boost Blog Traffic site. http://boostblogtraffic.com/   Every time you land on this site, the first thing that you’ll see is their opt-in box making you an offer that is rather irresistible.

Booyaahh!  Boost Blog Traffic's Site
Asks you to sign up at the top of every page.

I should tell you that Boost Blog Traffic is an excellent resource site with some of the best blogging tips I have ever read.  Just outstanding!

In a blog, you can easily create an about me page as well as a home page.  I would have a way for these individuals to sign up or join your email list on all of these pages.

With a blog post, you can easily make it so that your opt-in box appears on every post.  This would be most advantageous and would save you a lot of time.  (Unless you are selling multiple products, then you are going to need a way to have a different sales page for all of the different items.

Red Bull has an interesting, yet clear call to
action on their Facebook page.

Step 5 Write a clear call to action (CTA).  When people come to your landing page, you have to assume that they are reading and comprehending on an 8^th Grade level.  So, you’ll want to make  sure that your call to action as clear as possible and that they’ll know exactly what to do.  Use large, bold text when you tell them what to do, too.

You can also use arrows, different colors and a host of other indicators that will direct your prospects to take the desired action that you want.  Just remember, the simpler you make things, the more people you’ll have signing up to your website. 

Step 6 Use advertising copy to get prospects to take action.   If you have absolutely no idea how to write ad copy for your landing page, you may want to consider hiring an ad copy specialist to get the job done.  A good copywriter will create a powerful headline for you, that will draw in your readers in and influence them to take immediate action.  

Step 7 Minimize the number of fields to fill out.  Make sure that you minimize the number of fields that are needed to get a person to sign up.  Unless you are asking them for ordering information, you really don’t need to collect home address and phone numbers.  Most web savvy marketers just ask for email addresses because their sales funnels are designed to sell bigger ticket items later on down the marketing road.

Step 8 Offer them something for signing up.  If you are just starting out,

you can offer a free report on a subject that people are passionate about in your niche for signing up to your email list.  The report doesn’t have to be more than a few pages long, and you can knock one of these out relatively fast in a weekend.  Once that is complete, you can begin working on bigger and better things like 20 to 50 page eBooks.  Once you have an eBook completed, you can then offer that for signing up to your list as well as the free report.

TIP:  The more things you can offer someone, the better the chances are that people will sign up to your mailing list.  I know a copywriter that offers 10 free eBooks for signing up to his email list.  The eBooks aren't flimsy either, I remember one of them had at least 100 pages of high-impact information in it alone!  

So the more you have to offer, the easier it will be to reel in email addresses!

Step 9 Project a professional appearance.  You don’t want a flash site, but you need to have a site that professionally projects what it is that you do.  Once again, using the dirt cheap start up method I’m so fond of, you can easily get a very simple and elegant design from a freelancer on a site like Fiverr.

When you’re starting out it is always best to start out as cheap as you can, with something simple.  This particular blog started out on Blogger and at some point it’s going to be migrated over to WordPress.  

Why?  

Even though I know a little about long-tailed keywords and all that other SEO junk, I’ve read repeatedly that having a regular blog (not a free one) with a regular .com will work wonders for your rankings.  Plus having a professional appearance is important too.

Step 10 Produce incredible content.   The natural inclination of almost all entrepreneur newbies is to gloss over blog posts and web pages.  You need to adopt the mindset that people are going to reference and read what you’re producing.  If they are going to spend time reading your material, then you need to try to make it the best that you can. 

Many times I've seen the question asked, “How many words should I write?”  I've seen all sorts of answers for that, but as my research concludes, that large, well-written, 2000 + word posts do the best. Yeah, that’s a lot of work, but if you want something bad enough, you’ll do it.

TIP: One other thing, try to start with the end in mind. Remember that you are building a reputation, brand, and persona that will be with you a long time. 

I recently watched a series of interesting Youtube videos on marketing that a young entrepreneur was producing.  Obviously, he was trying to appeal to a younger, hipper audience, because his theme was marijuana based.  He had some dope-head kind of theme, logo, etc. 

Even though I liked his video and advice, I can’t help thinking that he was setting himself up for failure further down the road with his business.  Once he gets older and decides to take his business real serious, he may have a hard time shedding that old image.

At any rate, you need to choose your path carefully, because you don’t want to be changing horses in a middle of a stream.    If you start gaining a particular following, you’ll want to keep it in place for as long as you can.  So, keep in mind that you’re going to have to live whatever you create.

Contact Me with Your Thoughts

If you have any thoughts, ideas or rants you’d like to share about the subject of list building, please leave them in the comment section along with your URL or contact information.  I haven’t turned anyone down yet. 

To your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

“When it Comes to High-Response Copy – I’ve Got Your Back!”

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

elmo033057@gmail.com

Infographic That Will Show You How to Grow Your List Overnight!

Because building a list is so vital and important to your Internet marketing efforts, I'm spending the next few blog posts writing out a strategy for you to use in building a list rather quickly.  Since I'm making a rather detailed series of posts on this, I'd like to share this great infographic with you, to give you some inspiration.

As you are going to find out, your email and customer list is where the real money lies, because it is an indication that you have either sold or gotten a response back from a prospect or customer that trusts you.

When you begin to gather tools like auto-responders you will become acutely of companies like GetRsponse, Aweber and MailChimp, there tracking tools and how they can help you.

But before you start playing around with these shinny new toys, you're going to need to set up a plan for your list building and execute it.  

Below is a great info-graphic from GetResponse that shows you how to set this all up.

Enjoy! 

Brought to you by GetResponse Email Marketing

How Attitude Thoughts On Internet Entrepreneur Success Principles Can Supercharge Your Business!

Everyone wants to be the next Bill Gates, Steven Spielberg or Walt Disney.  However… what are you willing to do to get there?  If you believe that the successful just happen to fall into these lofty positions, you need to read their stories. 

Success is rarely easy. Let’s face it, very few of us will be born a Rockefeller and inherit the world. 

I could tell you that you are probably better off not being born rich, but I don’t want to shove my personal dogma down your throat. 

In my humble opinion, you’re better off attaining wealth on your own over time, but I’ll stop there.

Once you start checking into the back-stories of some of these impressive people, you’ll probably be glad that you’re not in their shoes, especially when you consider the responsibilities they have.

When these folks make a decision, their butts aren't the only ones on the line, but everyone else’s as well.

 In the case of Spielberg, whenever he makes a movie he’s responsible for thousands of people and their reputations.  If a movie that he’s making turns out to be an unmitigated disaster, then everyone that’s working with him gets tarnished too.

And the results aren't the only thing he has to worry about. He’s responsible for the safety of his crew, the logistics of when and where his filming is going to take place, dealing with unions, budgets etc.  I don’t know about you, but I’d be folding, fast.

Not to mention that the road to this lofty position isn’t exactly fun either. 

The Mouse That Almost Wasn't

Take Walt Disney for example. 

(Now, who wouldn't want to be the next Walt Disney?)  If you skip over the fact he dropped out of high school to go and fight in WWI you’ll see that he worked for years as an advertising artist, making slim wages. 

(Actually, he wasn't even successful in getting in the army because they found out he was underage.) 

After that, he went into business with a friend making short cartoons for movie theaters.  That company went bankrupt because the profits weren't even coming close to covering the expenses of the business.  

After that, Disney produced an animated series called Oswald the Lucky Rabbit.  However, the main stake holder in that business tried to reduce Walt’s compensation on those cartoons, so he protested.  Eventually, Walt was on the street again, looking for another gig.

After those fiascoes, Disney created a series based on his character Mickey and the rest is history.  But the point needs to be stated that this was not an overnight success story.  It took him years of blood, sweat and tears to get to his first successes…And even then it wasn't easy to maintain!

The Life of an Entrepreneur Isn't Easy

So, I guess it goes without saying that if you’re going to take on the responsibility of becoming an entrepreneur, you’re going to have more responsibilities than you have now.  

But hey, that’s what you want to do if you want to be more successful than everyone else, take on more responsibilities!

In the past, someone pointed out to me that if you want to be more successful in life, you've got to step it up.  A homeless bum might have a free and easy lifestyle, unencumbered by responsibilities. 

However, he also has no home, family or life worth living either. 

That’s kind of the safe way to live, isn't it?  When you don’t step up and take responsibility for your life, it’s almost a comfortable, safe cocoon you can live in. 

“Just let me lie around, sleep, and eat… I’ll be content, like a good dog.”

What a waste of life!

How Can You Make Lots of Money on The Internet?

If you frequent any of the Internet marketing forums where wannabe “netrepreneurs” frequent, you’ll see this question asked almost daily,

“How Can I Make Lots of Money on The Internet?”

 As a matter of fact, you’ll also see the responses of seasoned entrepreneurs that frequent those forums lament that they are sick to death of those types of questions. 

Usually, people that want to start Internet based businesses, or any other type for that matter, are looking for a simple strategy they can follow to make piles of cash.  Part of the reason why these people think this way, is because they've been conned by marketing hype they've seen online.

Everywhere you look on the Internet there are pages and pages of successful entrepreneurs that make the bulk of their money “selling the dream.”  I’m not saying that there aren't any good Internet marketing products out there, because there are.  As a matter of fact, there are some stellar products that you can buy that will help you learn the business.

 

However, when you read much of the advertising copy that accompanies the desire to buy, the sellers won’t tell you everything they went through to make it.  Some of these people were on their last dime, some of them were single and didn't have many of the responsibilities that many of us experience, and most of them failed at their endeavors many times before making it. 

So, the illusion of Internet marketing success is you can do something fun, hang out online and use social media sites to make a wad of money. 

The Salesman Experience = Good Internet Entrepreneurs

What I've found in almost every case, is that most of the people that make it big were already salesmen and businessmen of sorts BEFORE they became online entrepreneurs.  That’s why so many of them take to writing advertising copy like a duck to water.  They've already been memorizing sales scripts for years before beginning to write copy. 

To a certain extent, many of these online successes already had selling and writing sales copy in their blood, so whenever they hit a wall or an obstacle in their businesses, it was just another day…another experience to learn from…another way to grow.

The average wide-eyed optimist online doesn't have that kind of experience and therefore, when they don’t get have a successful experience right out of the starting gate, they have a tendency to give up pretty quickly.

Attitude Thoughts: How You Can Turn This Around and Start Succeeding

While I can’t speak for every type of business model that I know is out there, I will tell you that there are quite a few things that you can do to help yourself move in the direction of success with your business. 

1.        You’ve got to get serious.  Almost every day, I get up at 6:00.  This includes weekends and holidays.  If I have everything set up from the night before, I can get a solid two hours of writing in before anyone else gets up to bug me.  Why do I do this?   Because I’m freakin’ dedicated. When I had an online embroidery business, I worked from 6:00 AM to sometimes 3:00 AM the next morning.  If you are going to be successful and show others around you that you mean business for real, then you’ve got to get up and kick butt.  Make plans and schedules and stick to them like glue.  Your friends and family will be amazed!

2.        Become an authority in your field.  If you want to really be taken seriously, then become an authority.  There are many ways to do this.  For one thing, you could write about your area of expertise quite extensively.  You can get articles published in trade magazines, journals, or even write a book. 

A book is actually the best way to gain authority quickly because it has a “Thump Factor”.  If you hand a client or customer a solid copy of a book you’ve written, it immediately establishes you as an authority. An online eBook can have a similar effect, especially if you sell a Kindle version of it on Amazon.   If people like your eBook and make a ton of comments on it, chances are they’ll look to you as the “go to guy” for your respective niche.

3.       Use a planner regularly.   Get a planner and use it for real.  Don’t just buy one and let it sit there.  Buy one and use it every single day.  Plan everything you can think of and set your goals.  Put a start and ending date for projects and ideas to begin and end.  This way, when you complete each goal, you can check them off one at a time and you won’t get discouraged by a lack of completion or a lack of direction.  Don’t forget that small goals eventually equal big goals.  As Zig Zigglar used to say, “How can you hit a target if you don’t even have one?”

4.       Use a whiteboard.  In conjunction with #3 above, use a small whiteboard to place your goals on.  Why?  So you can have your short term goals right where you can see them until they are completed. 

A few years back, I bought a $25,000 house that needed rehabbing and using small whiteboards I was able to knock out every single short term project that needed to be done with efficiency.  

Since almost every single wall, ceiling and floor had to be ripped out of that house, as well as a few extra rooms to be built, you can’t imagine what a lifesaver having those whiteboards were.  Especially since nobody believed rehabbing this house was possible.  We completed the entire rehab in about a year and a half.

So, a good strategy is to make a list of all of your chores that culminate in completing your goal and place the white board on a wall where you have to see it often.  Then, as you complete each goal, you can cross off each chore or segment as you get it completed.   You will definitely have an incredible sense of completion as you near your over-all goal.

5.       Never forget the value of a client or a customer. A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to see a documentary on the life of the painter/instructor Bob Ross.  It was a most enlightening 2 hours, to say the least.  Not only was Bob a great painter, able to knock out pieces of art with great flair and pizazz, but he was also an excellent instructor.  But the main thing I’ll remember the most about the documentary were the stories that were told on how he handled his customers and students. 

In the early days of his painting instruction business, Bob didn’t get very many students to the art stores he was going to give his classes at.  One time, only one man showed up and Bob’s business partner said, “Hey Bob, why don’t we pack it up.  Only one man showed up, I’m sure he’ll understand.”   That wasn’t good for Bob Ross.  

Bob told his partner, “If only one person showed up then we’re going to give him the best lesson he’ll ever get on how to paint.”  And he worked closely with the man until the store was about to close.  That’s the type of care and commitment you have got to show to everyone you meet in your business.

Make Sure You Hit the Road…And Hit It HARD!

As you can see, the path to success on the Internet business model is just like any other business; fraught with all kinds of problems and hassles, just like any other business.  If you are really going to go down this road, then congrats! 

I truly wish you all of the success in the world.  But please, bear in mind that you are going to have to pour your guts into this.  I’m not going to sugar-coat this one little bit for you, because that would be doing you a big disservice. 

You've got to find your personal niche, create a plan and execute it with everything you've got.   

One last success strategy before I sign off…

6.        Read as many success stories as you can.   Read about Bruce Lee, Jack Lalanne, Vince Lombardi, Bill Gates, George Washington and other famous people that made it to the top.  This will give you encouragement and keep you motivated on a daily basis.  God knows, there will be enough people out there that will try to drag you down, to include jealous relatives. 

    If this article was a blessing to you and helped, please shoot me a comment or an email and let me know what you think.  I’d love to hear about your successes and also help you out by fielding any questions you may have about this subject and others.

God Bless!

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

The Incredible Pinterest Hoax - Driving Targeted Traffic To Your Site

Women seem to like Pinterest
for some weird reason.

For those of you that don’t know, Pinterest has been around since about 2010 and it is a unique spin on Internet photo-sharing.  The easiest way to describe it is that it a digital, online version of a bulletin board that you can pin pictures of things that interest to. (Hence the name “Pinterest”.)  

You can take a look at and follow other people’s boards, you can invite people to join you, (similar to Facebook), and you can re-pin other people’s pins.

People use Pinterest to not only pin personal pictures and things of interest to them, but what entrepreneurs have the ability for businesses to showcase their wares and business messages on Pinterest.

If You’re Going Down That Road…Make Sure You've got the Horses!

Since we can probably all agree that using as many social networks as we reasonably can to get our marketing message out is important, we can all probably agree that since Pinterest is a site we probably can’t ignore. 

And since we can’t afford to ignore it, we need to know how to use it.

However, don’t think for a second that using Pinterest is going to be easy-cheesy-peasy.  Just like all other social networks it’s a HOAX to believe that you can just do a few simple things and get away with it. 

This requires work, persistence and care, just like all other forms of social media marketing.

I would like to point out that this is another one of those dirt cheap methods that requires no money to market your business.   It merely requires a free account with Pinterest to post your pictures and get your compelling message out to the masses.

Pimp Yo’ Board with Blog Pictures!

Here’s a great way to get followers to follow your blog or website.  Some people refer to the area on your Pinterest site wherein you post articles a “blog-board”. All you have to do with this little gem is to post the URL of your Blog post to Pinterest using a very simple and easy interface that they provide.

So, each time you post on Pinterest, you can merely drop your URL in the box they provide you and an image and a link will appear on the board where you are posting.  

Even though this is a dirt-cheap method of marketing, I wouldn't use this as a sole means of driving traffic to your blog or website.  Mostly what you'll get on many of the social media sites are folks that are looking for people to sell their own wares to and tire kickers.  

Selling YOUR Stuff On a Pinterest Board

If you want to sell items on Pinterest you can easily do so.  You need to make sure that your items

I said you could sell stuff on
Pinterest....I didn't say you'd like it!

have very good, high quality pictures with them.  Pinterest usually has a drop down menu on it that will allow you to look at different types of items to buy that range between different price points.  

When someone on Pinterest clicks on a price range, ( like the $100-$200 range)  Pinterest will then take them to a board that has items that are selling within a price range. Personally, I think this is a huge waste in time looking over items like this versus going on Amazon and typing in exactly what you need.

Once you've clicked on a product, you are taken to similar screen that has pictures of items that are similar and similar in price.  

I kind of look at buying things on Pinterest like a huge browsing tool for people that just want to blow money.  Like it's burning a hole in their pockets and they're going to float around on there until something strikes their fancy.

Let's Go Grouping!

Not to say that the site doesn't have its merits.  For one thing, Pinterest will allow you to network with other people that are in the same niche as yourself or in the same industry.  However, it is hard to find other groups that are similar to yours because there is no search feature that will help you find groups.   

You can get re-pinned if people find what you have to offer interesting, but finding groups to hang with that are similar to your interests are slim.  There is a site called PinGroupie that will allow you to look through a list of Pinterest boards that you can search through.  

There is a drop-down menu that allows you to go through entire categories and determine which ones are relevant to your search.

The Big Hoax...Revealed!

Just like other social media sites, using Pinterest to market your business isn't a real significant way to generate traffic.  

In order to get a decent amount of traffic from social media sites, you'll have to work a bunch them simultaneously before you get any significant traffic, and then that will only occur on days that You are posting on them.  

After that, you'll have to go back and re-post several times before you will notice a spike in your traffic.  However, if you couple this with all of the other dirt-cheap methods I've shown you to generate traffic to your site, you'll be a heck of a lot better off than someone that went into hock to get started 

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

Samsung's Incredible Customer Service - A Successful Model For Marketers to Follow!

Samsung's Amazing Customer Service

There's always room to learn about marketing from an experience.  This was a pleasant surprise for me because whenever I have a problem with a big corporation, it's usually not a very good experience.  

Kudos to Samsung and its customer service. 

Last night I had to call the company up because there was a drive for their new printer that was preventing it from working properly.  We had bought the printer from Samsung but it was on sale and even though the printer wasn't that old, the drivers still needed to be updated.

So I didn't realize the drivers had to be updated and I decided to call them up.

However, in the past, I've had to deal with companies that seem to love to make their customer service a “hidden service”. 

However... 

You can have the greatest marketing plan in the world, but if you don’t back it up with a good

product, and customer service, all that great marketing will go to waste. 

So, I was prepared for battle.  I looked online expecting a long hard search for Samsung’s customer service number. Within the first 4 or 5 keystrokes, there was Samsung’s customer service number in big, bold lettering staring me in the face on Google results page for the name "Samsung".

I called and went through a menu that took me exactly to the service department I needed to talk to.  I was very surprised that I didn't have to listen to elevator music for 30 minutes, like I usually do with tech departments.

A Really Pleasant Surprise!

What I think Miss Judy
looked like.

 The initial screen-er profusely apologized for the problems I was experiencing, and he took some of my information. 

Before I knew it, I was on the phone with a nice lady named Judy.  Judy profusely apologized about 5 times for the problems I was experiencing and she reassured me that we would have them fixed in no time.

 After giving her some more information, she remotely accessed my computer and fixed the problems herself, without my having to touch the computer at all.  The only thing that took some time was she downloaded a batch of drivers into my computer.

Since I live in out in the country, my Internet connection isn't too fast, so those downloads took a little bit of time.

By the time Miss Judy was finished, the printer worked better than before.

Once again, she apologized for the problems I was experiencing and asked me if there was anything else she could do for me.

I told her that she was wonderful and that Samsung was my new pal. 

I now own a new Samsung tablet.

In my humble opinion this is marketing done right.  I can't count the times I've tried to call a company or tried to communicate a problem I'm having with a product only to find that the contact information has been deeply hidden inside of a sealed vault.

Man, that is horrible marketing.  

There is absolutely NOTHING that gets my blood boiling red hot than having to deal with trying to find a customer service number and then once it's found, having to deal with being put on hold while listening to elevator music.

So Thanks so much Samsung for the wonderful experience you are truly going to emerge as a leader in your market!

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis

"When it Comes to High-Response Copy - I've Got Your Back!"

www.MarkEllisCopy.com

(859) 797-9560

elmo033057@gmail.com

How to Build a Ravenous, Loyal Marketing Fan Base - Dirt Cheap!

Internet Marketing Gurus are EVERYWHERE!

Usually whenever you read anything about Internet marketing you hear about the latest whiz-bang method that someone claims to have thought up. 

Of course, they’ll tell you that it is a SECRET way to make money online, but in reality there is no new thing under the sun.

Trust me on this. 

Now, having said that, I’d like to point out that there are people on the Internet that you should listen to because their information is valuable.  They’ve been around the block quite a bit and know what they are talking about.  Their books and courses are pretty good and I think if you want to pay $200 + to buy one…Go for it!

You’ll probably learn a lot more from those courses than if you went to college for the “4 year vacation” and you’ll have spent quite a bit less.

The Dirt Cheap Method of Learning

I once read an article by Gary “The Prince of Print” Halbert wherein he was talking about the lean years of his life; he didn't have a lot of money and he was dealing with an overbearing wife. 

However, Monsieur Halbert was a smart man, and he knew that he was living in the richest country in the world. He knew that he could learn a crap-load about marketing if he read a lot of books on the subject.  So, off he went to the public library where he read every book on marketing he could get his hands on.

Yeah, I love it…The DIRT CHEAP method of learning!

He didn’t need to pay someone $5000 to learn how to make money marketing, he just needed the information available and he took it from there.

Not only can you learn from books in the library, but now we have the Internet as well.  Amazon, sells tons of books on just about any kind of marketing you can imagine, and you can get the books used for a lark. 

TIP!  Not only can you find used books in online stores like Amazon, but you can also get FREE reports and eBooks by many of the top-o-the-line gurus for the mere cost of your email address.

Your Marketing Can Be Dirt Cheap Too!

While it would be bone-dead stupid for me to tell you that you’ll put zero dollars into your marketing, you can still market your business as cheaply as you can and still have an effective way of reaching out to potential prospects and customers.

One of the cheapest ways to do this is by building a community.  It takes work but it’s not as hard as

you think, either. The fastest and easiest way to do this by simply being nice and helpful.

When I say “being nice” I mean it. 

I was on a forum the other day and I made a comment about how people don’t even say thanks by pushing a simple button on the forum that says “Thanks” on it.  (You can read my rant that started a group of people talking here: Your Attitude Sucks – That’sWhy You’re in Neutral! 

The problem I have with a lot of Internet Marketers, (especially younger ones) is that they think if they’re snarky, rude and use a bunch of foul language they’ll get somewhere.

BIG MISTAKE.  This is where I draw the line and tell whoever it is that I’m not even going to listen to them anymore.  Not only that, I’m NEVER going to recommend their business to anyone, ever.  I can’t tell you the number of times that I've not recommended someone based on their attitude and language.

Especially Internet marketing gurus that think it’s cool to do so.  Apparently, they think they’re so rich, powerful and invincible that they’re too big to fail.

Man, is that a stupid way to act.

About 2 years ago there was a guy that had a way of marketing on Facebook that was kind of popular so I went on YouTube to see if he had a training video on there for free.  

Sure enough he was on there, and it was a video of a seminar of his that he had recorded live in front of a large audience. 

About 30 or so seconds into his dissertation he starts spewing out the “F” word like it was a badge of courage.  And the real sign of immaturity was that he laughed at himself every time he said it.

Very impressive.

And to think there were ladies in the audience and had to listen to that rubbish.   

Now riddle me this…

If a person like that runs their filthy mouth in front of an audience, especially where women are present, do you really believe that he’s doing ANYTHING in your best interest?  Really???

It’s been my experience that people like that look at you like a number with a monetary symbol in front of it and that’s all.

Why you should never do this…  

But, you know what?  Let them be that way.  Because entrepreneurs that really care about the people they deal with are RARE!  People that respect others, follow up and help people sometimes without any gain in life are very hard to find these days.

And if you treat others with respect and dignity and call on their higher qualities rather than their basest instincts, then you’ll have gained a loyal following of people that know you really care.

Years ago, I saw a documentary about this guy who unclogged sewage lines for people.  He really had his business down to a science and really made a huge difference in his community. 

The thing that drew my attention the most to this guy was he had actually built a mini- shower in the back of his van.  He also had a whole row of uniforms hanging up in his van that he would change after almost every appointment. 

“I don’t want to smell like a rat when I go to somebody’s house.” He grinned.

He worked in a rundown part of a large city and was booked solid. Everyone knew and loved this guy. 

The reason? He was always super nice, extremely professional and his prices were very fair.  I remember one older lady that had no husband, and was obviously broke crying because the man did the work for free.  He looked at where she was living and saw that the services were going to break what little she had left. 

“Now, Ma’am please don’t tell all your friends I did this for free OK?  They’ll be calling me off the hook and I can’t afford to help everyone for free.  OK?  I just had to do it because you’d be up to your knees in sewage.”

“Thank you…Thank you!  The woman cried, tears running down her cheeks.”

Pushing his hat back and scratching his forehead he smiled again.

“She’ll tell everybody.”

However, this man was one of the most successful people in the business.  He was making money hand over fist and booked solid BECAUSE EVERYONE KNEW HE REALLY CARED.

It’s like the Joker said in that Batman movie,  

“It’s not about the money…It’s about sending a message….”

But hey, even if you don’t want to be Mother Teresa, think of how little he has to spend on advertising and marketing.

I’m tellin’ ya what Forrest…All the shrimp you can eat!  Dirt Cheap!

Even if he didn't want the attention, he’d get it and the people he helped won’t ever forget what he did for them.

Here's a company that really gets it. Watch this video:

So, random acts of being nice and helping folks can be beneficial to your business.  If you can’t afford to give something away, give away your expert opinion or advice because it costs virtually nothing to give those away.

To Your Success!

Mark “Elmo” Ellis