When you enter online marketing, you’re told to pick a niche.
And you’re told that health, wealth and relationships are the big three. Pick a sub niche in any of these, and you’ll likely do well.
But what if you want to do better than “well?” What if you want to dominate your market?
The first people into the big three markets had it easy, since there was ton of demand and very little competition.
Those who followed had it tougher.
And today, while the demand is still there, the competition can be brutal.
Unless…
Unless you continue to niche it down.
Markets (heath, wealth, relationships) are saturated.
Sub-markets (weight loss, forex, dating) are saturated.
Which is why you’ve got to specialize even further.
Study the competition and the processes they use, and then create your own market.
Here’s how:
1: Audience and Slogan
Your first step is to choose your audience and then target them with the right slogan – a slogan that promotes change.
If you look at recent American presidential campaigns, you’ll notice a trend:
George Bush Sr’s slogan – “A Proud Tradition”
vs.
Bill Clinton’s slogan, “Time to Change America”
John McCain’s slogan, “Country First”
vs.
Barack Obama’s slogan “Change we Need!”
Hillary Clinton’s slogan, “Fighting for Us” and “I’m With Her”
vs.
Trump’s, “Make America Great Again”
All three of the winners talked about change.
Why? People want change. They are dissatisfied, which is why they will buy into your message and your products, IF you can show them that doing so will create the change they seek.
Ask yourself what will get your tribe excited enough to follow you.
2: Setting Your Audience’s Hair on Fire
Next, issue a challenge to your audience – one that gets them fired up.
What is it that your audience wants?
To look 20 years younger and make their friends crazy jealous?
To get six-pack abs without the gym?
To strike it rich in six months with cryptocurrency?
Issue a challenge to your audience that sets them on fire with enthusiasm.
3: Create Your Tribe
By making your audience feel like they are part of a tribe, they will self-identify.
Look at the CrossFit people – they are diehard fans because they identify as part of the CrossFit tribe.
Brand your business AND your audience.
4: Create an “Us vs Them” movement
This could be a manifesto your tribe can rally around, or an actual movement of us vs them.
If you look at American politics, you see this tactic being used every single day.
5: Don’t Improve Them – Switch Them
People don’t want to lose weight – it’s hard and they’ve already failed a bunch of times. Plus, who wants to admit they’re overweight?
But people do what a new opportunity.
So give them status. Show them how they can have a brand new billion dollar body – not just a 20 pound weight loss.
This is a new discovery for them, making it fun and exciting. Plus, they don’t have to remember the pain of all their prior failures.
Once you switch them to your brand, pile on the new opportunities within the opportunity you initially switched them to.
These steps make the difference between a $100,000 business and a 7-figure business.
When you first get started online, you might be worried. Frankly, you probably should be worried. Yes, you made sales this month. But will you make sales NEXT month? And how will you pay the bills if you don’t make sales?
It can be scary going from a job where you know exactly how much you’ll get paid and when you’ll get paid to working your own business online.
In your business you might have a banner month and then two months of starving followed by a mediocre month followed by (hopefully) another banner month.
Thus, the question becomes, “How do you get stability in your business – and your income -as quickly as possible?”
Or… how do you KNOW for a FACT that next month you can make the mortgage and eat, too?
Simple – continuity programs. Call it what you want – memberships, recurring payments, monthlies, etc.
It all boils down to getting people signed up into a continuity program so you can continue to get paid month after month.
Now you have a choice here: You can either promote other people’s continuity programs, or create and promote your own.
If you’re acting as an affiliate, then you don’t have to worry about sales funnels, membership content, customer service and all of that. You just need to focus on making the sales.
Drive the traffic, offer your own bonuses and do what you’ve got to do to get people signed up.
The problem, of course, is that in exchange for less responsibility, you also have less control and more competition.
The membership site owner has control over content. If s/he takes a “churn and burn” mentality and doesn’t care about keeping members happy, then people won’t stay long. You’ll have to continually make new sales, which isn’t what you’re looking for.
You want stability. That’s why you only want to promote truly great memberships and continuity programs that deliver a ton of value.
As to competition, you are competing with every other affiliate who is promoting the same program.
If you have your own list, then this isn’t that big of a problem. After all, people on your list know and love you, right? And so they’ll follow your recommendation.
Unless they’re on someone else’s list (they are) who has already promoted the program. In which case, you’re not going to make many sales.
Promoting affiliate memberships is a give and take. Less responsibility, no control and lots of competition.
And this is why you might want to start your own membership. Look around and see what people in your niche desperately want and need, and then fill that want with your site.
Outsource the content creation if you can, so you can focus on the important part – filling it with people.
Once you’ve got your membership site up and running, it’s time to get busy promoting it. Use every technique you can think of and track everything.
Find out what your best sources of traffic are, and then put all of your effort into just those methods.
For example, maybe you buy traffic from Facebook, Adwords and solo ads. You also get free traffic from guest posting, forums and social media.
9 out of 10 new members are coming from Facebook, so what are you going to do?
Drop all of your other methods and focus exclusively on Facebook advertising.
Get your conversions up and your costs down and now you have a viable way of getting a continuous influx of new members into your site.
Want even more members? Show affiliates how well your offer is converting, and you can get them to promote your membership site, too.
There are plenty of affiliates out there who want that continuous, month to month income that a good membership site provides. All you have to do is show them that your funnel is converting and members are sticking.
Naturally, there are a lot more details than this to starting a membership site. But hopefully this gets you thinking in that direction.
Because if you want true financial freedom as quickly as possible and with as little stress as possible, then almost nothing can beat having your own successful membership site.
One more thing – the first site is the hardest. Once you have a membership site that’s clearing at least a couple of thousand dollars each month like clockwork, continue to build on that one while building your second membership site, and so forth.
Create a membership empire to secure your finances, and then you can experiment with anything you like.
In Chip and Dan Heath’s book ‘Decisive,’ they lay out three ways to make truly excellent decisions that can have a very positive impact on your business and your life.
1: The Vanishing Options Test
In 1994, Quaker Oats made the decision to buy the drink company Snapple for a whopping 1.8 BILLION dollars – perhaps one of the worst business decisions of all time.
They didn’t consider any other options. Believe it or not, no one in the company even argued not to buy it or suggested an alternative.
If they had simply expanded their choices by asking, “What other options do we have?” they would have been far more likely to make a better decision.
Do you decide to do things without giving yourself multiple options first? Do you limit your choices before you even start?
For example, instead of asking, “Should I promote this product to my list?” Ask yourself what other products you might promote instead that would be a better fit for your list.
Instead of asking, “Should I buy this piece of software or hire this person for my business?” Ask yourself what your other options are to get the task done.
Here’s why it works: Anytime you give your brain a ‘this or that’ option, it’s hemmed in by just those two possibilities and won’t think any further.
Instead, ask yourself, “What options would I consider if my current options disappeared?”
By giving yourself multiple choices instead of just one or two, you greatly increase your odds of making a good decision and even the best decision for you and your business.
The key is to expand your choices before you narrow them down.
2: The ‘Tell My Friend’ Solution
In 1985, Andy Grove, President of Intel, faced a problem – should he end the company’s line of memory chips, or not?
Management was torn on the question and Andy didn’t know what to do.
So he asked himself, “If we got kicked out and the board brought in a new CEO, what do you think he or she would do?”
Now the answer was obvious – get out of memories.
The right question made a tough problem easy.
This question helped him to overcome the biggest enemy to making the correct decision: Emotions.
You’re angry at your husband so you don’t talk to him. You’re excited about getting the exact make, model and color car you want, so you overpay. And so forth.
These decisions are clouded by emotion, and if it weren’t for that emotion, you would make different decisions.
Here’s why it works: Your emotions cloud your logic. So instead of asking what you should do, ask, “What would I tell my best friend to do?”
This helps you to look past your emotions and makes even the toughest decisions easy.
3: The ‘Test it Now’ Solution
In the late 1990’s, Bill Gross wanted to sell cars on the internet. He was sure the idea could work, but at the time it was risky.
Would people spend $20,000 on a car they’d never seen, much less test-driven?
Bill didn’t try to guess. Instead, he engineered a test run by hiring a CEO for 90 days to do one thing: SELL ONE CAR over the internet.
Usually we do the opposite. We go all in on a decision without having a clue if it’s the right one or not.
We spend all of our time and resources on this risk, when we could have gotten our answer with one small test.
For example, why hire someone as a full time employee when you can hire them for one project and see what they do?
Why spend six months creating a huge information product when you can create a small one in a day and see if there is a market for it?
Here’s why it works: We often get so fired up about a new idea, that we don’t even take time to find out if it will work or not. But by running a small test, we can see if we should proceed or go in a different direction.
Whenever possible, create a small test to find out if you’re on the right track.
“Why am I guessing when I can run a small test and know for certain?”
That’s it – three techniques that can save you a load of headaches and money in your online business and in life.
So many products are simply a rehash of other products, and the same goes for books.
Someone wants to write a book on persuasion, so they buy five books on persuasion, read them and then take all the best ideas from the books and write a new course or book or whatever.
But what if you want truly unique, stand-alone info that no one else has?
Then you’ve got to go to the sources.
Let’s say your niche is cat care, and you’re in a forum where people are discussing how they helped their cat get over a certain illness. In that forum you meet Jessie, who found a way to cure her cat in half the normal time at one-tenth the normal expense.
You contact Jessie and ask for an interview, which you then turn into a product. No one else has this information because it’s something Jessie came up with in her veterinary practice, or wherever.
You now have a product no one else has. Split the profits with Jessie, and do it again and again with people who know stuff that no one else knows.
For example, you can dig through various niches and find people doing new, unique, unusual things, or people who have just achieved some sort of milestone, or anything special that solves a problem or gives a benefit that people want.
Do an interview over email, Skype or any method you choose. Let your subject know you’re thinking of using this in a product, and that you’ll share the profits. Almost no one will turn you down on this, especially if you’re working outside of the make money niche.
And now you have an endless source of truly new, helpful info that you can turn into posts, products and books.
This is a great way to make a big name yourself in any niche. Pretty soon people will be approaching you, asking if they can share their discoveries in exchange for a slice of the profits.
Simply write up the info they give you, pad it out as needed, write some sales copy and get busy selling it.
This is a perfect business model for almost any niche outside of IM where money is being spent.
And it works especially well if you’re solving people’s urgent problems – like getting kitty over her illness twice as fast at one-tenth the expense.
There are only so many hours in your day, which is to say, you can only do so much.
In the beginning of your business, you’re probably doing everything yourself.
But as things start working and making money, you’ve got to scale it up if you want to keep growing the business.
If you don’t scale, then you can’t grow beyond the point of what you can do alone.
That’s why you want to begin outsourcing as much as you can. And the easiest way to do it is to record yourself performing each step of your business, so you can hand the recordings over to an outsourcer to do these things for you.
Either write it up, take screenshots or use video recording.
And no, it doesn’t have to be perfect. You’re simply going to hand it to an outsourcer and let them take over the task for you.
Remember, your goal is to work ON your business, not IN your business.
Otherwise you will have trouble hitting six figures and you will never come close to that magical seven figure income.
There is a thought in online marketing that if you just get the mechanics right, then everything will fall into place and you’ll get rich.
I’m not here to dispute that.
Rather, I’d like to suggest that mindset plays a bigger role than most people think.
After all, if thoughts are things – and quantum physics tells us this is true – then what you think can have a huge impact on the success of your business.
Don’t believe me?
Take two people – one has a track record of building million-dollar businesses. The other has a track record of never having had a major success in his life.
Who would you bet on to build a million-dollar business? The one with the track record, of course.
But let me ask you this… do you think that both of these individuals view business – and specifically, the acquisition of money – in the same way?
You might guess that the successful person who has made millions of dollars sees money in an entirely different way than the person who has never been successful.
One sees opportunity everywhere – the other sees obstacles.
One sees challenges to overcome – the other sees problems that cannot be solved.
One believes leverage is the way to get rich – the other believes hard work will win the day.
One believes money is abundant – the other believes it’s scarce.
One thinks about how to make more money – the other thinks about how not to lose money…
… and so forth.
If you take the second person – the one who has never had a major success – and implant the thought patterns and beliefs of the first person concerning money and business…
…do you think the second person could then build a million-dollar online business as well?
That’s our question for the day. And you, with your consent, will be our test subject.
If you’ve never built a million-dollar business but you would like to, then I’m challenging you here and now to adopt the following thoughts and make them yours.
This means that reading them once won’t be enough. You’ve got to integrate them into your thinking 24/7. They have to become as much a part of you as your belief that you should eat, sleep and brush your teeth.
You’ve got to believe in these as much as you believe the sun will come up tomorrow.
In other words, you’ve got to make these thoughts YOURS.
You might do this by rereading the following list when you wake up and when you go to sleep each night.
You might write them out long hand, or record them and listen to them on your Mp3 player.
Just do whatever it takes to make these thoughts your own.
And just so you know, we did not pull these out of thin air. They come from a very solid book by Steve Siebold entitled, “How Rich People Think.” We’ve simply put our own online marketing spin on them.
If you’ve ever wanted a roadmap on how to be rich – I dare say this might be it.
Take these thoughts and combine them with any proven online business plan, and you should be making money – significant money – in no time at all.
Your results will vary. Remember that making these thoughts yours is just the first step – working your business is the second. And doing one without the other is probably just going to waste your time.
Just to be clear, we’re going to differentiate the two types of thinking as “Non-rich” and “Rich” thinking.
“Rich” is, of course, a relative term. To a millionaire, a billionaire is rich, while the billionaire might think the millionaire is poor by comparison.
Let’s get started…
The non-rich think: The rich are obsessed with money
While the rich think: Being obsessed with success is a wonderful thing
Why is it that we think obsessions are necessarily bad? If a person is obsessed with being healthy or with helping others, we generally don’t criticize. But if they are obsessed with being successful, we like to point out that there is something wrong with them. But why do we do this?
Most likely because it’s easier for us to say they are wrong than it is to become obsessed with success ourselves.
When you’re rich, you have the ultimate freedom to do what you want, when you want. Money is simply a gauge by which you measure how successful you are.
If you can think of business as a game you love to win, then you can become obsessed with success in a healthy, productive manner.
It’s all about what you can accomplish and how many people you can help with your online business.
The primary motivator for many millionaires is reaching a certain net worth – a number that is different for everybody. Assuming your business is legit and helps people – and hopefully it does – then the bigger the number you reach, the more people you’ve helped.
And think about this: when you hit your number, then you are free to chase higher pursuits such as philanthropy, time freedom and personal fulfillment.
So yes, go ahead and get obsessed with success. If that means working on your online business 14 hours a day for a few months, go for it. Success is calling and it’s time to answer that call.
The non-rich think: Saving is the way to get rich
While the rich think: Earning more money is the way to get rich
The non-rich cling tightly to their meager assets because of fear of loss and uncertainty of the future. Then when an economic correction occurs, they suffer catastrophic losses they cannot recover.
The rich, while understanding that saving and investing are important, also direct their energies toward making more money by serving others and solving problems. If a catastrophic loss occurs, they turn their attention to financial opportunities that occur in a downward economy and often become all the richer for it.
It’s a question of whether you operate from fear or abundance. Either mindset can lose money, but only the abundance mindset can quickly recover the money and more.
Focus on building an online empire of several different income streams, not on saving pennies.
The non-rich think: Trading time for money makes sense
While the rich think: Non-linear thinking and leverage is the way to get rich
Any time you’re trading your time for a paycheck, you’re actually trading the most valuable commodity you have – your precious time – for a fixed income.
If hard work made fortunes, every fast food employee would be rich.
The rich generate money through ideas that solve problems. And since there is no limit to ideas, there is also no limit to the money you can earn.
The right idea at the right time can make a fortune. Facebook, Amazon and Microsoft are classic examples of this.
Look at your own online business and you can see this at work. For example, if you write a book to sell to one person, you are trading time for money. This is what ghostwriters do.
But if you sell the book yourself, you can continue to sell copies of it every day for the rest of your life. You get paid over and over for work you did once.
And if you hire someone to write the book for you, now you are experiencing true leverage.
The non-rich think: Rich people are evil
While the rich think: Rich people are ambitious
The average person has been programmed to think rich people are somehow evil, dishonest and deceitful.
And while this is occasionally the case, as a general rule self-made rich people have used their drive, ambition and vision to build something that helps a lot of people.
Believing that rich people are inferior or morally lacking makes a great excuse for why a person isn’t rich – after all, they’re a nice person, and they don’t want to hurt anyone.
But if the non-rich will take responsibility for their financial plight and adopt the thinking of the rich, then they, too, can become rich.
And in the process, they can prove that not all rich people are evil.
The non-rich think: Being a lone-wolf is an positive quality
While the rich think: Building wealth is a team effort
When the non-rich folks have jobs, they’re paid for their individual efforts. They’re lone wolves, and they believe that if they start their own business, then they have to do it on their own.
But the rich (and future rich) know that building anything worthwhile is a team effort. Finding the right people and leveraging their knowledge and action is key to achieving success quickly and on a large scale.
The rich are team leaders. The non-rich try to do everything themselves.
The rich know their strengths and weaknesses and find people who fill the gaps in their knowledge and abilities.
The non-rich believe they can eventually learn everything they need to know to become successful.
If you can build a team and share the credit for your success, then you can achieve almost anything, and do it in a surprisingly short amount of time.
But if you go it alone, success will always be just around the corner and just out of reach.
In your online business, figure out what you’re good at and what you enjoy doing. Then outsource everything else. This will shave your time from conception to launch in half or less, keep you happy and more than double your profits.
Try it – once you do, you’ll never go back to trying to do everything yourself.
The non-rich think: Money is bad
While the rich think: Money is fantastic
If you were to ask most people why they don’t have money or even just what they think of money, you’ll realize why they’re broke.
They see ambitious people as greedy and self-serving. They think money is a necessary evil that must be managed but should not be their focus.
And there are better things to do with their time than be successful, like watch TV, sports and so forth.
The rich see money as a positive tool that can create freedom and opportunity to do what they want and have the life they enjoy. Money removes restrictions and lets them do what they want, when they want and where they want.
When you have money, you can engage in your favorite pastimes, help out the less fortunate and improve life for others beyond yourself.
Whether you believe money is evil or a tool for empowerment will make the difference between whether or not you have money.
The non-rich think: Formal education leads to wealth
While the rich think: Specific knowledge creates wealth
While rich people respect a formal education and encourage their children to attend university, they don’t see it as a way to build a financial empire.
Many self-made millionaires have very little formal education. They’ve amassed their wealth through getting, using and selling specific knowledge and information.
College typically prepares a person to trade time for money, and this is rarely the way to real wealth.
Rich people work from a non-linear mindset, with no limits or boundaries.
Give an employee a problem, and they will try to solve it for the company.
Give someone with a rich person’s mindset a problem, and they will not only solve it, but then sell the solution to everyone who needs it, thereby creating wealth.
And if the person with the rich mindset can’t solve the problem, they’ll hire someone to solve it for them, and again sell the solution to make their fortune.
Problem solving is an asset that can build empires. While academics and the middle class see problems as being complex, the rich mindset is able to break those same problems down to their essence to find the solution. Bill Gate’s founding of Microsoft is a wonderful example of this trait at work.
As an online marketer, you have the opportunity to present solutions to people around the world.
And you don’t always have to find the solutions, either. You can act as a reporter, finding out what people need and then reporting back to them with a product that fills that need.
The non-rich think: About spending
While the rich think: About investing
Do you really, truly need that new car? Or will your old one last for a few more years?
Living beyond your means isn’t living at all. It’s self-imposed slavery, where you have to go to work just to keep your nose above water and eek out a meager existence.
The self-made rich primarily buy the things they truly need and the things that will make them more money. True, once they become wealthy they do splurge, but by then they’ve earned the right.
Many self-made millionaires are ordinary people who went without luxuries and extravagances while they were building their fortunes. Instead of lattes and going to the movies, they invested in stocks and real estate.
But the real answer isn’t just to be frugal and live on as little as possible – it’s to double or triple your income and invest a large portion of that.
Ideally you want to live the good life, and if that means being cautious with your finances for a few years while you increase your income and your investments, it’s well worth the price you pay to then be financially free.
Investing your money into your online business can be the most freeing thing you ever do. Imagine being able to retire in 5-10 years, and then ask yourself if watching your money for that length of time while focusing on making more was worth it.
The answer will invariably be yes.
The non-rich think: “If only I could win the lottery…”
While the rich think: “Let’s get busy and make this happen!”
People love the lottery because they think it’s their only chance to get rich.
Sadly for most, they’re probably right. And it’s not because they’re not capable, either. It’s because they don’t believe in themselves and their ability to create wealth.
The rich know that talk is cheap, and take daily action to build their wealth because they know they can do it.
Beliefs dictate behavior, and behavior dictates results. If you believe you can succeed, then you’ll take action to do exactly that.
That’s why you’re in online marketing – because you believe you can succeed. But do you really, truly believe you can become rich?
If not, you might want to adjust your thinking.
The non-rich think: Money changes people
While the rich think: Money reveals people
The average person has beliefs that money turns good people into greedy, corrupt, uncaring jerks. This limiting belief not only keeps people poor – it also serves as an excuse for why they’re unsuccessful.
But the self-made rich know that success and money reveal the true person inside. If you were a crook before you were wealthy, you’ll be an even bigger crook once you’ve got money. If you were kind and generous before becoming wealthy, odds are you’ll do a lot of good with your money to help people, animals and the world.
Take a good look at your own personality, and then imagine them amplified by wealth. Do you like what you see?
If so, great. If not, you might want to make some changes now, before money amplifies traits you’re not proud of.
The non-rich think: You have to have money to make money
While the rich think: You should use other people’s money to get rich
Did you know it’s easier to borrow $10 million dollars than it is to borrow $10,000? It sounds crazy, but this is exactly how the rich think.
They don’t use the words, “I can’t afford it.” Rather, they think in terms of, “Is it worth buying, investing in or pursuing?” If it is, they find the money.
Again, this is all about linear thinking: “I have to make money in order to invest it in order to get rich.”
There’s nothing wrong with this, except that it takes time. A lot of time. And life is short.
Let’s say you’re starting an online business. You’ve got a proven business model that works, along with a great product. You could work yourself silly getting free traffic in order to get sales. Or you could get an investor who can pay for traffic. In the first case, it might take you months to make enough to buy consistent traffic, at which time your product might already be out of date. But in the second case, you can send massive, targeted traffic to your offer from day one.
In the first case, profits will come slowly. In the second case, you’ll be making solid money from day 1.
The non-rich think: Self-made rich people are somehow smarter
While the rich think: Self-made rich people are more savvy – not smarter
Memorizing information to get good grades in high school or score well on an IQ test won’t make you rich. There is a theory that the “A” students end up working for the “C” students, and this is likely true more than we realize.
Different people are smart in different ways. Some can memorize information, some are good at physical things, some are music smart, and others have an ability to figure things out.
The self-made rich have a talent for making money. Fortunately, no one is born with this talent (how many babies have you seen on Wallstreet?) which tells us that this talent can be learned.
And the best way to learn to make money is to find out what’s working for others and model their success.
That’s why ‘how to make money’ programs are so popular. People want to be rich, but they don’t know how to do it. They want someone to show them the ropes.
This is key if you’re in the make money niche. Explain to your prospects that your system is proven to work because others are already making money doing it.
Just follow the blueprint, and you can succeed. Just make sure your products live up to this promise.
By reading this article, you are now one step closer to becoming rich yourself.
And by knowing, understanding and incorporating rich thoughts into your everyday life, you are setting the stage for your own success.
Oddly enough, this article wasn’t about money at all – it’s about mindset.
And when you have the right mindset, then everything else falls into place.
The ‘secret’ isn’t all that secret, and yet most marketers get this wrong.
You simply have to give a much higher value than the price that subscribers pay, and two things will happen:
They will join in droves, and they will STAY and continue to pay.
It doesn’t matter if you’re charging $10 a month or $1,000 a month. Just make sure that your members are getting far more than the price they are paying.
For example, let’s say you want to build a membership on how to start an online business.
If you give your subscribers an eight week guarantee (think ClickBank) and a promise that they can start earning by the fourth week, you’re in business.
If you further promise full email support, you’ll do even better. Yes, you’ll outsource the support, and it will be well worth the cost. Many members will join just to get that live support.
Subscribers get new content each week, they have 8 weeks to get a refund, they’ll be making money in just 4 weeks, AND they have live support – do you think that might be a winner?
Absolutely. And you can use a similar model no matter what niche you’re in.
Let’s say you teach golfing. You promise that in 4 weeks they will shave 4 strokes off of their game. They have an 8 week guarantee. And sure, maybe you even throw in live support of some kind, too. Again, you’ve got a winner.
Always give far more in value than you’re charging for your membership sites, and you can’t go wrong.
Did you enjoy the Olympics? Every four years we get to see the best of the best and their gold medals, but sometimes the best inspiration comes from those who don’t win – or even someone who came in dead last.
In 1988, Eddie “The Eagle” Edwards became the first competitor since 1928 to represent Great Britain in Olympic ski jumping.
How did Eddie do? He came in #58 out of 58.
But it didn’t matter. His fans loved him for other reasons. He had no trainer, no money, no practice facilities – and some called him the great British loser.
He had a cheerful air of bumbling incompetence, epitomized by the big pink goggles he wore.
Says Eddie, “I got my letter saying, ‘Congratulations, you can represent Great Britain in the Olympic games’ when I was in a mental hospital in Finland. I wasn’t a patient. I was there because it was the cheapest place for me to stay.”
On getting ready to do his jump, Eddie says, “There were about 85 or 90 thousand people in the ski jump area, and I thought this is going to be really good, I’m really going to go for this. The Germans and the Swiss and the Italians were going down jumping, but the crowd were ignoring them and chanting, ‘Eddie! Eddie!’”
“And I got out and sat on the bar and they started cheering and cheering and it was great!”
“When you sit at the top of the ski jump, you look down, and you’re probably about 500 or 600 feet up from where you’re actually going to finish. You can see a million and one different reasons why you shouldn’t really go down. So you do have to be not a little crazy, but probably a lot.”
“You’re traveling at 65 or 75 miles per hour. Within about a second you’ll be 250 feet up from where you’re going to be landing. And you just try to relax and let your skis carry you to the bottom of the hill.”
“It’s the most exciting, exhilarating feeling in the world.”
Eddie’s British record jump of 71 meters landed him in 58th place – out of 58 competitors, 19 meters behind the jumper who placed 57th.
And if you ask anyone in Great Britain, “Who won the Olympic ski jump in 1988?” Almost no one could tell you.
But if you ask, “Who is Eddie ‘The Eagle’ Edwards?” They’ll tell you all about the crazy ski jump guy who they still remember and love to this day.
Eddie stood on the top of the precipice and said, “Geronimo!”
The British people were so proud of him for just trying, that winning didn’t matter a bit.
He dared to go where most of us won’t. Yes, he came in dead last, but he will be forever and fondly remembered by his country for doing what no one else had done in 60 years.
So what daring thing are you afraid to do? Whether it’s something online or in real life, take Eddie’s example and just go for it.
You’re just starting out and your list only has 500 or 1,000 people.
While it’s true you would gladly trade your small list for one that’s 100 times bigger, it’s also true that if you treat your little list right, you can still make really good money.
How does that work?
By getting personal.
First, answer emails that you get from your list. When someone reads your latest email and takes the time to write to you – answer them. You’ve only got 1,000 people on your list, so odds are only 5 to 10 will ever write to you at a time. Yes, you can do this. Keep it personal.
Second, let your list members know that they are part of a very small, intimate, private community by telling them. Otherwise they’ll assume you’ve got a gazillion people on your list and don’t give a flying flip about any of them.
Third, email them daily. Yes, DAILY. Keep in constant contact with them. Update them on the latest news and give a tidbit here and there about yourself.
Fourth, care about their success. If you really, truly care, then it will show in your emails to them. Communicate how important they are and that you want to help them succeed in a big way.
Fifth, hold open Q and A sessions over webinars, Skype or your favorite platform. Don’t charge anything, and let your subscribers know it is only for your list. You’re creating the feeling that they belong to a small, exclusive, private group.
Sixth, send out emails that start with something personal, such as, “Hi (name) – I wanted to contact you personally because I think you might be a good fit for my coaching program.”
Seventh, ask for their help or opinion on something and then answer every response.
Doing these little things will keep your list engaged and interacting with you.
And when you send out an offer for just 10 people to get personalized coaching at $500 a month, what do you think will happen?
Odds are you’ll fill those slots in less than a day with no additional effort at all. You might even have a waiting list of people who didn’t make the first ten slots.
What happens when someone emails their list of 100,000 with the exact same offer? Surprisingly, there’s a good chance they’ll have trouble selling those ten slots, even though their list is 100 times bigger.
You can make great money with a small list when you take the time to get personal with your subscribers.
Okay, your competition has been around longer than you.
They know more than you about your customers, your products, your marketing…
…let’s face it – they’re racehorses, and you’re a mule.
But what does that mean?
New marketers feel like they are coming into a race when it’s three-quarters over.
Seasoned marketers know more, have more tools, more contacts, more customers, bigger lists, more outsourcers and so forth.
How is a mule to compete against a tried and true racehorse?
One step at a time, that’s how.
In 1976, the Great American Horse Race – 3,500 miles long through 13 American states – had 90 teams of purebred racehorses competing…
And 1 team of mules.
That’s right, mules – competing with thoroughbreds from across the world in the perhaps the longest, greatest horse race ever.
Entered in the race were Viking horses from Iceland; Arabian stallions, favored to win by almost everyone; tall Irish thoroughbreds; striking Appaloosas; and horses from France, Australia, Denmark and Japan.
And then there was Lord Fauntleroy, the mule. “Leroy,” for short, was the choice steed of Virl Norton, a steeplejack from San Jose, California. Lady Eloise was the backup mule. And no one – no one – took them seriously.
3,500 miles later, you already know who won: The most unlikely victor in any horse race, ever. As Leroy crossed the finish line into the stadium, he flopped his ears and gave a victorious “hee-haw.”
The mule had won with 315.47 total hours. Second place went to an Arabian, clocking 324.6 hours. That’s right – it wasn’t even close.
When you think you can’t compete – when you’re sure you don’t know enough, have enough experience, don’t have the contacts or whatever thought is going through your head, just think of Leroy.
No one expected him to win except his owner and rider, Norton.
Maybe no one expects you to win, either, except maybe your spouse or loved-one.
That’s okay, because if you simply stay in the race and be consistent, you can outshine them all… Or at least cross the finish line with a lovely payday for yourself.
