I just had so much fun on an interview that I had to share it with you right now...

You know there are no accidents in life, so when I was asked to stand in on the Empowered Spiritualpreneurs BlogTalkRadio program by Sharon Wilson, to interview Lorrie Morgan-Ferrero, I could not have found a better topic or person to interview.



There is a change in the way we all market, and while it's not just about women, Lorrie shares her approach, experience, and understanding that we need to combine the old traditions of direct marketing (what she learned and is driven by the language/style of men) with the new communication styles of interacting, collaborating, and being subtle in marketing (what many term the female style, though I think this is changing in all copy).

Lorrie covers how to market to women without all the hype including:

•   Why the marketing we've used for nearly 100 years finally needs an update (and how to make YOUR marketing more effective);
•   The 5 easy factors that must be present at all stages of marketing to women (skip just one of them and you're likely to lose her loyalty forever);
•  What her innermost values are so you can tailor your marketing and language for long-term connection (HINT: if you're trying to sell hamburgers to vegetarians, you're barking up the wrong tree);
•  Exactly how to win her back if you've made major mistakes in the past (we can't change what was, but we can sure repair what IS);
•     Hypnotic tactics that move her toward taking action to what you want NOW (signing up for your newsletter, buying a product, hiring you...whatever your goal is, Lorrie can show you how);

Check it out and let me know what you think...

Peace
Declan

PS  You can check out what was offered on the call to listeners here.

As the Internet keeps growing, everyone loves to talk about how cheaply they run their business.  Ever wonder why so few talk about the results?

People get writers for $1 to write blogposts (actually great idea if you are search-engine driven, yet if you are trying to impress people...you are paying less than a cup of coffee for your reputation), and brag about the $1...and I rarely hear anyone else bragging about the results, the words.  Because what you paid for was $1, not quality.

Myth 1.  I read the 4-Hour Workweek or the E-Myth, and it's easy for Tim Ferriss...I'll just pay someone $10 an hour and forget the rest!

This is my favorite myth;  Ferriss has run a successful business and while he may not be spending the farm for help, he understands that it is the quality of your help, and how much time/money they make/save you, not the price you pay for them.

Key Takeaway;  those entrepreneurs who brag about how little they pay their outsourced workers get what they pay for...it's not wrong to pay a little extra, because let's face it, $10/hour is barely minimum wage these days.

Match your expectations to results;  as the old saying goes, garbage in, garbage out...or mediocrity in outsourcing, mediocrity outsourcing.

Myth 2.  I don't need to watch my business, I pay someone else to do that!

Anyone who has run a business knows that you have to watch your people, encourage them, and yes, even talk with them.  Many people consider outsourcing a rushed, edgy, fractured email or discussion, throwing the kitchen sink at some poor person and expecting them to magically produce results.

Even tougher are those working with people outside their native country;  you think people can't understand you in English, try it in Russia, or Tagalog, or Mandarin.

Key Takeaway; Outsourcing is not just giving somebody else the responsibility, it is watching and helping them, and understanding that they are likely working with many other people...which is why you get them so cheap.

Myth 3.  My outsourcers don't respond to me and I don't think they care!

They don't respond often because you pay them for a few hours a month, so you get those hours when they have them.  One of the smartest people I know wins with outsourcing by calling people, giving them small gifts...and here's the big secret:

He says thank you, and he's always touching base -- not for a long time, for a quality time so they want to do a good job for him. He was always "selling" his people on how fun it was to be with him, was organized, and paid them on time...and even called when he paid them.

It took no extra time, and generated much better results...and also, he trained them for a few weeks so they understood what they were doing, how to do it, and what the expected turnaround time was.  Just like customers, outsourced employees need to be guided, nurtured, and watched.

Just like a garden, a plant doesn't grow if you ignore it.  It dies...like the other people, the many, who fail with outsourced employees.

On the other side of the fence is the business who tries to do this all via email, never trying to get the outsourced employee engaged/involved.  They just send requests, get stressed, and don't realize that if they actually read the emails they send out loud, they would hear a noisy, push, nutty person trying to get someone to do the work.

You get more when you plan, watch, and grow your outsourced workers, then when you expect them to do things while you just sit on the beach.


Want to get to the beach?  Teach them how to do it, get them to report to you on how they are doing, and touch base with them at least once a week, via phone, so you are both on the same page.

Outsourcing is not a myth, it's the illusion of doing nothing that is the myth.  Done right, you can do little, but you can never leave them on their own.

Peace
Declan

Back in 2004, I left my direct marketing agency world of big deals and ran into this small group of friends creating something called Spiritual Cinema Circle.  Like many in the affiliate world, I thought I knew it all, and while I like the project, I never dreamed it could have been a success.

Then I learned that within months of opening, they had 3,000 subscribers at about $20 a month, and I believe this rose to near 30,000 when they were acquired by Gaiam in 2006.

This was one of my first projects after leaving the hard core world of lead generation, CPA deals, and affiliate marketing.  This project helped me understand the power of the niche and of small teams, and in an amazing way, the ability of dreams to become real.  Just listen to this interview and you'll understand what I mean.

Is there anything really new in the Internet marketing Game, at least that makes money?  Ask most people and they'll tell you how smart they are...blah blah blah.  That happens in markets that are mature, at the top of the bell curve, and lacking innovation.

As I sat down to lunch in San Francisco with an old high school classmate, I didn't know what to expect.  Iggy Fanlo is the CEO of AdBrite, and was an integral part of the Shopping.com team that sold that business to eBay for over $600 million dollars.

We didn't really know each other in high school, and it was just a fun time to sit down with someone from back in the day.  Until we started talking about Internet marketing, and what he's coming up with at AdBrite, what I consider is a part of a new and exciting future for this business.

What's exciting is not just what he's working on, it's the look in his eyes...this guy loves the Game and is trying to reinvent the way we all buy and sell ads, an ad exchange instead of another "ad network" basically selling the same space under a different name.

The Game is changing, and Iggy's definitely got Game, because he doesn't believe that his brains, or success, or reputation defines his success...he's opening up the ad game, like an open source system for buying ads.

While I can't yet give you the specific details, just think of buying ads like a real time bidding process, giving you the best time, keywords, and ad space to target (and while Google does offer bidding on search, you just don't have the control -- or scale beyond just search -- that this system promises to unleash).

What's most interesting is the move beyond CPM as a measure of buying ads.  In the old days of ads driven by magazines and TV, advertisers would pay premium CPM for ad space, and less money for remnant.  Iggy pointed out the insanity of this process, because basically it's the same ad space, one priced at 10% of the other.  It's an old sucker game that is changing, partly driven by the ad network phase and partly because all advertisers are waking up to the reality -- ads must have a measurable result, not based on volume of impressions but on the activity generated.

For those in the performance marketing space, you know this and you understand the insanity of CPM;  you can't pay more than $1 CPM to profit.  The old branding dollars are also getting tied into performance, measurable results, and are realizing that just paying high CPM prices makes no sense. 

It's a reverse challenge;  the higher CPM you pay, the less people you reach -- while ideas like behavioral and contextual marketing rule, the reality is you get less impressions, and it's tough to scale.  So how do you buy ads, scale, and profit/get your brand out there?

You pay less CPM (cost per thousand impressions) and spread your bets around morepartners.  And start thinking of terms like RPM (revenue per thousand impressions) or the traditional eCPM (effective CPM or Net CPM you earn per thousand impressions) and you dare to build in measures that validate your ad buy.

While common sense to all affiliates and performance marketers, this mentality is finally starting to spread beyond the direct marketers and into the general ad buyers, both for brands and for niche markets.  If you want to get more customers, you have to think about getting more visitors, and there is only so much you can get from search...

Now that the ad network's temporary rise and fall have decimated the illusion of CPM online, you find some publishers wanting to get more money for their space and blaming the ad networks for gutting their value.  I think Iggy and I share a different viewpoint;  the gutting is part of the process.  And CPM is a lousy way to measure ad space value...monetization is what it's all about, and you can't monetize by measuring volumes of impressions.

We all need new tools, more than just bidding on keywords;  timing is so essential for creating sales, and also creating interest.  As marketers, we have knowledge but most of us don't know how to use it.  Variables like keywords, time spent researching, and surfing history can combine to deliver this knowledge, yet at the cost of privacy (a cost that doesn't seem to be favored in the current political climate).

For example, Iggy shared a story from Shopping.com, who found that most people buy digital cameras between noon-5 pm during the weekdays.  That was the best time to buy an ad, driven by the behavior of the customer -- and a behavior that is aggregated and doesn't violate the privacy of the individual.

So if you are selling digital cameras, buying the keyword in the middle of the night is crazy...unless of course it works for you.  Yet if the buying behavior is correct, you'd want to know how much to pay, not just by keyword but by time of day, and the site(s) that draw the right customers that you can convert at the right time.

Maybe I'm drinking the AdBrite kool-aid because of the high school reunion aspect of our meeting, or maybe it was just meeting someone who loves this Game like I do.  So many of the marketers today just brag about the money, when those who really create breakthroughs love the Game.

Because that's the difference between fly-by-night marketers and breakthrough entrepreneurs;  one replicates what others do, and the other replicates and adds something to the process to empower the market..and knows that is not about your ego, it's about your system's ability to let marketers do what they need to do without raping, pillaging, and plundering the audience (unless you are flogging.)

Which type are you?

I love this Game, and it's why I'm back to really blog, myself, for the first time since 2005.

If you know me, you've likely read or seen me speak so many times prior to 2005.  Yet since then I have not blogged, written, or shared information except on stage with a few friends.

Why?  Because like many writers know, you have to have the passion, the energy, and the drive to put the words and performance out. And instead of putting my own voice out, I tried a different approach. 

For the past 4 years I've decided to move behind the scenes and work with many start up businesses, experts, speakers, bloggers, and podcasters...

And what they taught me leads me to release this blog and project, called The New Media Game.  This is the third in my own Internet trilogy (sorry, I can't segway to any Darth Vadar voice because my father and I are good friends, and he's not dark side, he's an entrepreneur), driven by what I've learned, and what I see many folks are missing...hopefully I can add something to the discussion.

The New Media Game Defined:  Take the old Internet Game (search, email, and advertising) that still makes money, and adapt them to the new worlds of social media and mobile media.  I began working on social media back in 1994, because that's what we all dreamed about then...an Internet connecting people passionate about specific subjects, willing to discuss and interact.

We all wanted video and interactive groups, yet all we had were slow dial-ups and discussion forums, which amazingly kept ruling until about 2005.  With the rise of MySpace, Facebook, and Twitter, the world we all dreamed about is coming through.

While the technology was definitely not on anyone's radar back then, the principles of social media are the same -- the customer is in control.  As a marketer, I know we are all used to the marketerspeak of prospects, leads, and customers.

In this year long project, starting officially September 21 with the launch of my new book and System, I want to refocus my fellow marketers on a principle I learned long ago, yet that is just starting to come into focus.

The goal is to turn Friends into Fans and Customers.  Here's what I mean.

• Friends are people you are just meeting or have not met yet, not the offline term for friends.  You'll likely have a wider circle of friends online, because we don't have to deal with the limitations of the physical world...yet we also have to deal with the Vikings of the affiliate world, spammers, black hat search engine geniuses, and plain, old aggressive marketers.  They are attacking the Friends, which gives you the opportunity because....
• People are looking to Friends for advice and direction (though they definitely trust offline friends more than online friends by a wide margin)...yet the attitude is critical.  Treat them as Friends and try then to...
• Turn them into Fans if you want them to follow you, and if your business model is advertising different.  Fans are people who come back again and again.
• Turn them into Customers if you want them to buy from you...and to do this you have to stop throwing products at them in social media spaces and do what traditional direct marketers call the 2-step;  engage them, get them interested in you hopefully with an email, and with this then drive them to sale...like a lead to sale process.

Yet it all begins with the attitude, which is shifting and leaving most companies/people behind.  Stop talking about yourself and talk about who you like, what's interesting, and most importantly, as  your new "Friends" what they think...listen and react.

You don't run the Show, they do...and that's the fun part of it.  I'm looking forward to joining the Show, back on the stage after 4 years, again with you.

Peace
Declan