focus

Anyone who knows me will attest to my erratic attention span. Its done a number on things like grades, relationships, my finances you name it. But nights like last night are interesting to me. When I get into a project... And I mean really get into it, I can sit in one place for literally 8 hours and maintain hyper focus the entire time. I dont get up once. I dont turn away for a few minutes. Time disappears.

That happened last night. I am working on a sales letter and i fell into that zone. I started around 9:30 and didnt break focus until 2:30am. Hours of hyper focus and productivity. It amazes myself when it happens and I wish I could bottle it up.

We'll see if its a wasted 5 hours when I roll it out to my list.

Booooooo

Bad month. N0 profit. Lost about 20 bucks.

But lets talk about the long term thing here.

As of July 1 I have spent about $2,260 on Google.

I have pulled in sales totalling 2,300.

WooHoo. I guess. Its because of my lack of back end selling that is doing this. But as my list grows so will these numbers. Still this month was not good. I expected to continue the upward slope but I did not.

milestones

Okay things are getting interesting. I am consistently blown away by the math of this whole thing. I can almost predict (within a few hours of time) when I should expect a sale. Its amazing to me how something as erratic and unpredictable as human nature actually takes on patterns when looked at as a group.

I had 3 sales in one day yesterday (a first!). Of course I had gone a few days without a sale so they were much needed and appreciated. But I am now making consistent sales and the best part is I have boiled it down to the base metric I need to watch to make accurate predictions. Half of this whole thing is knowing what the hell to analyze. I realized when I first started this I was looking at figures that had no way to predict my success.

I am expecting a return soon because its been awhile since I had one so not looking forward to that email notification. I mention that simply for the sake of not jinxing myself. =)

Things are promising. It feels good. But until I am surpassing my current income I am still not 100% celebratory.

Nerding Out!

Wow Google Analytics has a cool function where I can create the entire sales funnel and watch the percentages of people who drop out or continue through it all the way to the sale. I am beside myself with nerdishness.

I FREAKING LOVE ANALYTICS.

I am going to have to fight myself to not watch the stats incessantly.

MIA

Not many posts lately but I am working consistently and seeing results. My list is growing (for free) and my profits are increasing by around 70% each and every month for the last 4 months. I am looking at about a $300 month this month.

Its tiny in comparison to the people I associate with but it feels good.

I have added a one-time upsell offer on the download page and so far 1 out of 3 people who saw it ordered. Good sign.

Testing will be the name of the game in the coming months. Headlines, price points, etc.

I gutted my autoresponder series and included a more installment oriented email series rather than random tips. The more I lead my customer down a path of success the better the conversions will be when I ask for the purchase.

I believe I can be realistically fully self employed by about 12 months or so. This is not random but based on predicted size of my list and sales forecasts.

But who knows.

dreaming the answers

so i go to sleep with my head swimming... how to make more sales, make what I have better etc.

I woke up in the middle of the night with an answer to one of my recent bigger questions. Good to know my brain is working when I'm not.

so many todos

I can think of a million things I need to do for this business. Time is becoming more and more valuable to me.

Sept Numbers

On top again this month by a little over $100.

My problems are that I easily get discouraged and I'm lazy. But at least they are not constant. I go through a few days of listlessness, this-isnt-going-to-work doubt and then I get inspired again and start working.

I need to see that I have done something a small people can say they have done. Make a profit on the internet. Its not easy. There are a lot of moving parts.

I am also going to test a 7 day, $5 trial period and see if that drives more sales.

upsell fail

I made a quick page attempting to upsell them when they click to order. Sales plummeted. I have removed the page and posted the old order page. We will see if that corrects the situation.

I am going to create a video upsell and test that instead.

Still on top for the month.

biggest productivity killer

I check stats incessantly... Funny how you can work on something but if you are not doing productive work then you are just wasting your time.

early update

I say early because I have to wait 60 days for refunds etc but I am currently standing at a 25% buy rate from my previous customers. 12 people clicked the email and three bought. Good numbers. Great actually. Still too early to know how non-customers will respond. I assume I have to create a whole new marketing message for them. But a 25% conversion rate from an email leading to a simple form is promising.

It proves that my customers like my front-end product enough to trust that my other products will be of value. (extremely important aspect of info-marketing)

I'm taking a moment to pat myself on the back and get back in there again.

ahhhhh (fear)

I just released my newest product... only to my current customers right now at a big discount.

Anxious to see what happens...

well well...

profit. To the tune of $236 since July 27th (when i picked up the pace). Its small but it feels like pure awesomeness.

lets scale it up.

month almost over

and I am in the black still! I have an idea to blow this month up even more, Ill keep you posted if it works. "You" meaning myself because no one reads this. But if I can finish this month and actually make money then that's a fantastic first step towards something cool.

fingers crossed.

more progress

jumping the gun as usual I am excited to see the numbers this month so far. I am actually in the black over $100. This is pretty great considering its all on front end sales. My knowledge of Pay Per Click advertising is directly responsible for this. I should go out and spend $100 on beer tonight.

=P

alright alright!

Even after ignoring the campaign for nearly the entire month I still managed to make progress for July.

Total Ad Spend: 299.81
Net Sales: 265.45

The 34.36 I spent is great because basically I acquired over 200 new people for my list for that cost. Something like 16 cents per lead.

Now its time to start focusing on profit. $137 product here I come.

new lesson

dont send emails out... make 0 sales. Send emails out...sales again. Hmm.

Almost done with the backend.

been awhile

still making sales. still not breaking even. But I have started on a backend product.

update

2 sales yesterday. One was from someone who already bought. I dont quite understand. But I expect the guy will request a refund to get his money back this 2nd time around. So not looking forward to that. But maybe he wont. Who knows?

4 sales for this month so far. thats an average of 1 every other day. (obviously)

I am going to record the ebook into an audio format, add a few keen insights and sell it as an upgrade for 97. Hopefully a decent percentage of people will opt in to the audio upgrade. Should take me awhile to record it so I need to just sit down and start knocking it out chunk by chunk.

but the numbers are good. People are buying. Im getting emails with great feedback. Im on track.

Kite

if this little side business were a kite it would be that point where you just get it off the ground and its struggling to catch the wind right to fully take off. You yank it and it might even hit the ground a couple times but for the most part its at least off the ground permanently.

Thats what I feel like. Struggling to get this little bastard off the ground. =)

8 sales this month. Still spending more than Im making but its at a very tolerable level. If only inacted the keywords that I know convert I would most likely break even but I have to keep expanding and searching for more profitable keywords so there is a good chance I will continue to lose money.

But building a list for this cheap is all most people can expect at my level. Its growing fast and I am seeing more and more frequent sales. Im well above industry standard for sales percentage. More than a whole percent which is great. Still the opt in process is expensive and cuts my ROI into the negative so no time for champagne yet.

I need to create a back-end product for at least $97

I need to split test every page I have for new headlines, different colored fonts etc.

I need to create more awesome free content to give away.

I need to find kick ass keywords that convert 2% and above.

I need to make 65,000 like my boss did tonight. He keeps half of it but still.

warm and fuzzy

i offered to give my product to a guy for free and he responded with this...

"I was going to buy your ebook either this week or next, so no need to send a free test drive (how is this for honesty?). I'm pretty sure after seeing your video I'll like the content of your ebook."

Very Very Cool.

more good news

I found an old report I wrote so I spruced it up and released it to my list. Within 5 minutes I had a sale. Now that is results I can live with. I am now averaging 2 sales a week (had some returns which kinda pissed me off) but I am slowly putting together how this whole thing actually works. I am also at or near break even so I am building my list for super cheap.

My concerns are email deliverability and spam filters. If I send an email to my list of 500 or so people it seems I am averaging 30-50 opens only. I dont understand why the number is so low so that has become my primary focus.

Got a nice email today from a guy who said he was impressed with my info and why i dont charge for it. This is EXACTLY where I need to be. The free content must be valuable and it looks like some people feel this way which is a great sign.

benchmark

two sales in 1 day. alllllllright.

dammit

"Hi my name is XXXXXXXX, my son XXXXXXXXX has stolen my debit card and ordered your product. He is a minor and I would just like the money credited back to my account I apologize for the inconvenience and hope that you will understand thank you"


Well there goes that sale.

weird sale

got a sale but i cant locate where he came from. This doesn't help me.

crap

got 2 returns....

but i did get a $70 affiliate sale.

inching towards nothing.

so I am getting closer to neither making nor losing money with this little venture.

Still deep in the woods however and I have scaling the whole thing up to worry about later. More money will be lost at that point (I can assume)

but promising results.

3 sales in 4 days

i had a bitch of a day at work and was checking my email when I got home thinking...you know what would make the night better...a sale.

low and behold.

This is starting to get interesting.

2 sales in 3 days

nice.

I am slowly creeping towards the break even point. Still losing money but not near as much as the last couple months.

metrics are like truth

my ego, my procrastination, my antsiness...

they all are crushed under the weight of hardcore mathematical proof of my marketing efforts...

my opt in rate, my sales rate, my click-through rate etc.

There are no easy shortcuts to making money online. From the very first action taken by the potential customer all the way to the sale... everything has to be taken into account and handled carefully. an extra 2 cents per click adds up quick and can throw off your chance for profit. A half percentage point change in sales rate means hundreds of dollars lost.

fascinating and totally terrifying at the same time. Yet I feel good knowing what I know. As Snake Eyes once wisely pantomimed... knowing is half the battle...

first sale

with the $47 price point. Still spent too much but its promising. Ill see if a few days pass without a return

interesting

I was handling my bosses google campaign. He wanted to take the success I had and scale it up by handing it over to "professionals".

Since doing so our numbers have plummeted. I knew I was doing something right but I had no clue how solid of a campaign I had. These guys are costing my boss thousands. Its the worst month since I first started this thing about a year ago.

to do

i wonder if I am in the norm on this...

I create these awesome to-do lists and never actually do them. Screw that. Lets make some must-do lists. If I create the list I need to promise myself its going to be worked on at least to some degree. I know the momentum will push me to actually finish them if I do that. For myself and everyone (or is that One) who reads this here is my to-do list for the next couple weeks...

-create video content
-finish new reports
-finish new sales letter (ugh...why did I write that one down)
-restart Google campaign with an understanding of the price point that will actually WORK.
-save and organize all receipts to get an accurate look at my cash-flow

new sales letter

Im pretty happy with it. Got some more to go on it but its shaping up nicely. Of course the market will be the judge of that but I am following the advice of some of the best in the industry in my niche so...

in the zone

last night I wrote a 14 page report that I am going to add to my products to increase the value. I have to raise the price point to $47 or else I'm going to keep losing money.

It was great. I took a few hours and really knocked out some quality content. I have a few more ideas for reports to add to the ebook and I will have more of a "system" than a simple ebook. Then I am going to rewrite the sales letter to describe all the new value. This is something I should have done since day 1 but I am an antsy dumbass at times....

expectations

so a very successful guy in my niche is friends with one of my good friends. I was informed that his average sale is made 80 days after first opting in.

80 days.

mindblowing.

i have to keep plugging my readers with good content for well over 2 months before most decide to buy.

Rollercoaster

Its a big emotional rollercoaster getting this thing off the ground. Dan Kennedy says that as an entrepreneur you will want to completely quit and throw in the towel several times before seeing real success.

great.

This month versus last month

Wow I am pretty pleased with myself. The numbers are pathetic all around but check out the difference...

Last month ad spend: 712.24
sales: 167.63

ouch.

this month ad spend so far: 157.86
sales: 89.89

My ROI this month is manageable. Keep in mind nothing changed about my product prices or marketing other than what I did within google. I brought my price per click down BIG TIME and just did a lot of pruning of keywords. If I add a backend or upsell of some kind and start making more affiliate product sales there is no reason I cant turn a profit. Then its just a matter of amping up the marketing on a bigger scale.


-

doubled my list

just realized that I could totally import the list of 230 names or so from my old old campaign I ran about 2 years ago.

My fear is emailing them and having them go "who the hell is this?" and flagging me as spam. So I am going to put together a free video with awesome content and blast em. That should help. If I can integrate them carefully I will have about 500 people on my list. This should increase my chances of affiliate offers converting and making more sales.

Just one example of all the things I should be paying attention to. I seriously leave money sitting on the table and its time to maximize every opportunity.

ROI

So my ROI is currently at a paltry 52.33%. For every $100 I spend I make back basically half of it. For a front end of 23.97 profit I guess thats pretty good but its time to get started inching those numbers higher.

I will only be happy with high 90s and beyond.

All its going to take is a higher price point, a lower cost per click and a better conversion rate on the sales letter and squeeze page.

Yes thats all. Jeeze why is it I'm not a millionaire yet.

(sarcasm...)

-

wracked with uncertainty

Frank Kerns product is 1997. I know I would get a lot out of it but jeeze that is a lot of money.

I am literally holding my credit card looking at the order page.

I know the guarantee. I know his credentials. Still Im sweating this.

Frank Kern

Just watched a video by Frank Kern, one of the Big Boys of online marketing. The video is literally 60 minutes of him breaking down his sales letter that generated him millions of dollars.

He is all about giving away massive amounts of FREE content before asking for your money. He also suggests that as marketers we do the same. We have to create incremental levels of trust and desire before shoving our product down his/her throat.

Trust that we have valuable info to give and simultaneously fueling that person's desire to achieve a specific outcome. Ideally by using our product or service to achieve the result.

It sounds simple but it really makes sense the way he describes it.

affiliate contact

looks like I have my first affiliate (with an actual list) sending out a blast about my site.

Lets sit tight and hope the guy generates some sales from it. The more affiliates making money off of me the better.

I have a long way to go

I find myself mentally adjusting my stats in various ways to protect myself from being disappointed. Its hilarious. This isn't a video game. This is real money.

I woke up at 3:30 this morning and honestly put together my vital stats of where I am so far. Its not so bad actually. I know what I need to do.

Its called research a back-end product and create the damn thing. Then upsell my customers in the buying process.

I also created a list of things I need to do. I then honestly looked at the list and figured which ones MUST be completed now. What was #1?

Get Google showing accurate data. No word from them since yesterday.


-

There is no room for Ego in marketing

This is something that is becoming more and more apparent to me.

Google is working on it

I think I must be the only person with these issues. I pretty much paused the campaign until this gets worked out.

conversion tracking

for some reason my conversion tracking with Google is not working properly. This sucks. I have tried everything imaginable to remedy the situation. If I dont know which keywords are bringing me sales then I need to stop the campaign until I can get this fixed. I am waiting on a "specialist" to get back to me with a solution.

Still seeing sales and I have paired down my google expense considerably but without the tracking info I am blindly going about this. sales hovering near 4%. Still great!

Why Am I So Stupid

Why on earth did I not wait to create a back end product before racking up something like $400 with Google?

I hope your impatience was worth it moron.

Yes the data is worth something but I would probably be even or close to it had I just been smarter.

wow

so for one hour of my bosses time he has now sold over 60 units at $997 a pop. He gets half of it. And guess how much it costed him to advertise....

Zero dollars.

"the money is in the list" - This oversaid quote is making more and more sense.

All the real estate gurus are talking about him. How did this newbie investor/guru make this kind of cash with his FIRST webinar to his list? Its simple.

He is a marketing genius. He does direct mail rather than share the same names and email addresses all the other gurus out there. He sets up smart joint ventures with people who have good products. He writes emails that get people to take action. The guy wont let me send an email until every single period and space is exactly the way he thinks it should be.

And he asks for my advice which I find pretty cool.

The super-cool thing is I am jacking the webinar structure and email series to my own endeavors. I wonder if it will work in my niche...

I got a new computer out of the success of that webinar. Its not mine but as much time as I spend up here its certainly going to seem that way.

yikes

So even though the numbers are pretty good I am still losing money. I think I have to change the price point. That and I have to both create a higher priced product and use other methods of traffic generation other than Google.

Im out something like $370.

I know what I have to do. Now its a matter of doing it.

Views of Money

I am starting to see the concept of money differently.

When I was younger it was very black and white. I had 5 bucks and it would get me something of value. I spend the 5 bucks, I get the something and then I consume it in some way and Im done.

If someone were to say to me...pay 5 bucks now for something that will bring you 10 bucks later I would balk. But its 5 bucks. Screw that. I might lose it.

I finally started implementing the education I have been paying monthly for. Though I am not seeing a full return on the money, I learned things that I will ALWAYS know now that will actually save me money later. The more I think about it the more abstract it seems. But its very cool.

Another thing is time. Time is actually worth something. I am fully willing to pay people to do tedious shit for me now. Its all about breaking down what your time is worth. Do I focus on menial tasks I can delegate for a few bucks an hour or do I actually hand over the task and focus on things that are worth more per hour?

Finally education. My boss's partner said something tonight. Poor people have big TVs. Rich people have big libraries. That makes sense. And though the noncomformist, smelly Saturn driver in me hates the thought of agreeing with "the rich", but its true. Its all about how you spend your time and what you choose to fill your head with that will shape the reality you find yourself in.

Don't tell anyone but I think I am growing up or something.

the power of information

I helped with the nuts and bolts of my bosses webinar tonight. The price point was $997 a pop teaching people how to invest in probate real estate. They sold over 35 units. Do the math. My boss said we should have happy hour soon. Aw shucks. Just glad I could help.

This is the business to be in people.

in the hole...but okay with it

So far I am about 250 in the hole with Google. There are a lot of tiny factors that go into bringing that cost lower and lower. The cool thing is I know what those factors are and I am moving in that direction.

Honestly it would have been less had I not been so anxious to get started. I suppose the feeling of stagnation is more painful than losing money to me. I don't regret it. It feels good to get this train moving. 6 sales and a double sale (?).

I am going to start looking for affiliates to drive traffic to my site. I see about 26 people already sending SOME traffic to my site via ClickBank. But they are probably hobbyists and might not know how to do it right. I need the the super- affilates willing to drop real money. I am prepared to give them the bulk of the sale for their time. Making $1-2 per sale but building a list of BUYERS is a sweet deal. My friend Mike used to make the bulk of his income from the work of about 3-5 super-affiliates. That kind of "eggs in one basket" scares me but he has since expanded his traffic sources. I saw his new Audi this weekend. Holy shit its hot. I just want a car with headlights that point straight and no dent in the hood. ;)

Nerdish Leanings

So I have two lives. One is music/other indulgences and the other is a deep fascination of marketing information products online.

It made for a very schizophrenic singular blog. So this is my lame business side. If you want tales of debauchery, this is not it.

For example....

I sent out a blast to my list today with my first affiliate product. My fear is that it will take away paying customers from my product. But when the payout for the affiliate product is more than my payout for mine....its hard to resist.

1 sale today. the sales letter is currently converting at 5%. Its pretty impressive. Now if I can just get my Google clicks to under 30 cents each then I will actually pull a profit on the front end. I have seriously been considering doing a split test for a 27 and 37 dollar price point. The extra 10 bucks would change everything.

Of course it would probably be easier to create a back end and upsell. Its on the list, believe me.