You know what doesn’t work when you’re selling?

Being Subtle Doesn’t Work

I feel like I’ve spent much of my life being subtle about just about everything.

Subtle about what I want…

Subtle about what I don’t want…

Subtle about the people I like…

Subtle about the people I can’t stand…

Subtle about what I want to buy…

Subtle about what I want to sell…

Somewhere in the back of my mind, some wires got crossed and I started thinking that being subtle was the same as having class, being sophisticated and taking the “high road.”

Of course the real reason was that I was probably scared of getting noticed. If I’m not subtle then people will notice me. And if they notice me, there’s a rather large chance that they won’t like what they see. And who could ever recover from that type of rejection?

See how vicious that is?

In business, falling into a cycle like that means you end up doing the equivalent of whispering with your sales and marketing stuff. You end up saying things like:

“Excuse me sir, would you maybe, possibly, by any chance have a need sometime for something somewhat like what I might be offering to you someday, like maybe today?”

That kind of approach makes you want to whip out your credit card doesn’t it?

Think About Relationship Building

Is it easier to build a relationship with someone who doesn’t really stand for anything (or doesn’t tell you what they stand for) or is it easier to build a relationship with someone who is so 100% committed to their cause (and not afraid to share it with everyone) that you can’t help (provided their cause resonates with you) but be attracted to them?

It’s no different when you’re selling.

You’ve heard that being polarizing is a successful way to sell right? Well you can’t be polarizing and subtle at the same time. At least not if you want to be effective. Because if you are, no one will even look up from what they’re doing long enough to notice you.

Being Subtle is Worse Than Being Bad at Marketing

In my book, there’s one thing that’s worse and more difficult to overcome than being a marketing hack or a business hack. That thing is being too subtle (scared) to even risk getting noticed.

To overcome being a bad marketer, you simply have to keep going and keep learning. Experience will validate or invalidate what you learn in books and courses. You just keep repeating the learning/doing cycle and things improve.

But being too scared to be noticed is an affliction that is far more difficult to remedy. Mainly because it requires a “fix” at a level much deeper than that of knowledge or experience.

Virgil Fox: the “Elvis” of the Pipe Organ

Bear with me here as I reach back into my former life as a pipe organ player.

There was a famous organist named Virgil Fox. You can see a video of him below:

It’s obvious he loved the spotlight. In fact, for many people of his generation, he was probably the only organist they knew by name.

There’s a “Virgil Fox 2,” if you will, of the pipe organ world named Cameron Carpenter.

Some people love him, but plenty of purists think he’s terrible.

He is NOT subtle. In fact, he’s the only classical musician I know who performs in a sequined costume (I’m not kidding.)

Take a look:

Now let me ask you a question. Who do you think sells more tickets to a pipe organ concert? A guy like Cameron Carpenter or little Mr. Church Organist who wears a grey suit, talks quietly and is afraid to look someone right in the eye?

That’s a rhetorical question, because the answer is obvious… but I’ll answer it anyway:

Cameron sells the tickets and Mr. Church Organist can’t even get 20 people to come out on a Sunday afternoon for free.

Same in business.

OK, so what if you’ve fallen for the “we’re evolved marketers now” brainwashing and you took down your popup in favor of something “classier” that slides in from the top or bottom of the screen? Something that’s not so, “in your face?”

Well, you’d better do something fast, because that’s the first sign that you’re about to slide into obscurity online. (I’ve done it, have the T-Shirt.)

Here are Some Sales Tips

1. If you have trouble asking for the sale or feel like you’re going to annoy people, let me help you with that by making two suggestions: First, get over it or make a living another way. Second, you are going to annoy people, so reread my first suggestion.
2. People are busy, please don’t assume they’re going to pay attention to you just because you have something of great quality to sell or something smart to say. Just to get them to even look up from their iPad or to stop thinking about what they want but don’t have, you have to be pretty in their face about it. Otherwise, they’ll pay attention to the person who is.
3. Ignore the people who have a problem with how you are doing things. Those folks are too scared to do it themselves and would rather comment on you. It makes them feel productive.

Internet marketing is a rat race.

And if you’re not careful, chasing the internet marketing dream can end up putting you on a (very) tiring hamster wheel for the rest of your life. I’ve been at this business for quite a few years, and I’ve made a ton of mistakes. But if I had to pick the single biggest mistake I’ve made, it’s that I lost sight of what I really wanted to accomplish. For me, that goal was a lifestyle. That’s still the thing that gets me excited about what I do each and every day: the lifestyle.

But I forgot that for a while. Instead, I took a detour and pursued money, thinking it would lead to a lifestyle. But it doesn’t on its own. It just leads to needing to generate more money.

How you earn your money is more important than how much you earn. That’s what’s true for me.

That’s not to say I don’t want a business that generates a lot of money. It’s just that my PRIMARY goal is generating that income on my terms, not by working like a tech savvy car salesman for the rest of my life.

You might be one sales letter away from wealth, but you’re also only a few cars and homes away from bankruptcy if all you can do is put together salesletters… unless you want to do it forever. Marketing is a very valuable skill but it can also be a prescription for a life of always needing to sell something if that’s the only trick you’ve got in your bag.

So that means I have to be a little more sophisticated than simply thinking that being able to sell things is the primary skill for success online.

That’s simply not true.

And yet, most people online are internet salespeople, they are not internet business people.

What’s the difference? Salespeople work hard, business people work smart. Salespeople focus on selling, business people focus on building businesses.

Selling is part of building a business. It is not the whole enchilada.

Why I’ve Given Up on “Internet Marketing”

I think internet marketing as a lifestyle is a hard, hard road. Look at some of the most “successful” people online. They work like dogs.

That’s not what I want. And I’m not willing to work 24/7 HOPING to make it some day by creating a killer product that everybody wants. I’d rather be slow and steady executing on a solid strategy than working for years “hoping” for a breakthrough.

But that means I need to actually be strategic. I actually need to have a strategy (I do, finally) and execute on it every day (I do, finally).

(If I lost you right there because I started talking about strategy and commitment and consistent work, this is probably not the blog for you.)

I don’t want employees. I don’t want a staff. I don’t want any of that. My goal is simply to be self-sufficient and take care of my own business. Because of that decision, however, I have to be disciplined about my behavior if I actually want to succeed. I have to cut out things that get in the way of executing on my strategy.

Here’s the litmus test I’ve settled on:

Does the work I’m going to do today contribute in some cumulative and leveraged way to generating results tomorrow and beyond?

If not, I need to minimize the time spent on that activity.

A really simple example of that is Twitter and Facebook.

How many times have you checked either one already today? Be honest, there’s no one listening.

Does checking those sites contribute to the execution of your overall strategy?

If it doesn’t, then here’s my challenge to you.

Get off Facebook®…

Get off Twitter®…

If you want to automate both those so they distribute content, fine. But give this a try for 30 days. I bet you it’ll be more difficult than you think.

If your experience is anything like mine, once you can those time wasters, you’ll realize just how organized you have to be. You actually have to think about the next steps in your execution plan. Otherwise you’ll just sit there and stare at your computer screen.

And that’ll make you look really dumb.

I found cutting the cord from all that quite challenging. Why?

It’s because of something I call…

The Urge to Do Something

It’s really, really easy to give into the urge to do something when your life or business isn’t the way you want it.

Checking Facebook is doing something.

But the bottom line is that you can either be “busy” or you can be effective. It’s not easy to be effective. I find it takes some real discipline. Being busy is easy and often fun.

But being busy is also the reason people work at this business for years and still have nothing to show for it.

What’s the strategy you’re executing in your internet marketing efforts? “Doing what works” is not a strategy. “Making a lot of money” is not a strategy. “Getting exposure” is not a strategy. “Becoming an authority” is not a strategy.

You need a strategy. You need a goal. Those two things will make your life so much easier because they will help you make decisions about how best to use the only real asset you have. And that is what you are doing right now.

Yesterday, I talked about the importance of developing real clarity about what internet marketing success means to you.

Once you figure out the right answer, the next step is to figure out how to get there. That’s the secret to internet marketing success.

Having been in this business for a long time, I’ve been on a quest for that elusive “secret.” One ingredient I know is important is commitment.

Commitment is a weird thing. You can try a lot of things online, looking for signs of promise, and then, once something starts working, you can commit to going down that path. Or, you can commit to making something work from the getgo.

Which is the right way to do it?

I think a combination of the two is probably a good fit for most people. The challenge with waiting to commit to something until it works is that you often times have to dig fairly deep before something starts working. That, of course, takes commitment

In the end, the real commitment you need to make is to yourself. To say, “I am valuable enough for me to commit to building my life the way I want it, no matter what anyone thinks.”

And that brings us to…

The REAL Secret to Internet Marketing Success

I’ve worked with some big names in internet marketing, mainly in capacities where I don’t exist to the outside world. Instead, I’m in the background making things happen–creating marketing campaigns, writing copy, designing web pages.

Based on my experience, the one most important secret to internet marketing success is your ability/willingness/sheer determination to keep executing. To chip away at success day after day after day.

In other words, show up each day, do what you do, and go home. Forget about today. Come back tomorrow.

Sounds boring doesn’t it?

It kind of is. And that’s why it’s such a secret.

That’s why so many internet entrepreneurs keep searching for another secret to internet marketing success. Surely they’ll find something that’s a bit quicker and more exciting?

But they never find it.

Those people may or may not ever find success, but from the outside, it’s clear they’re searching for the wrong thing. They are looking for a rush of excitement instead of a real path to success.

You deserve to treat yourself better than that.

The Monday Hotsheet

There are some very well known marketers that I’m grateful to call my customers who subscribe to the Monday Hotsheet.

If you are building your business on the internet and would benefit from a weekly injection of tips and findings from someone who is in the trenches every day, well this is your chance to get access.

Why is this Hotsheet so valuable? It’s because I’m actually more interested in doing things online than teaching them.

I’m not putting material together for my next course, I’m actually out there trying things and learning a lot along the way.

To subscribe to the Hotsheet, visit the link below:

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