“I’m not sure I’ve ever told you the story of THE lowest point of my career. Laura and I drove from Chicago to Nebraska over a steamy hot 4th of July weekend in our $1200 1985 Honda Civic whose engine had just $$$ blown out 3 months before. We were buying gas on whatever fumes were left on our credit cards. I’d been demoted from my sales job to production manager at a tiny manufacturing company. Now I was earning zero sales commission. To try make up the difference I took home “outsourced assembly” projects from work.

My project that weekend was tiny screw assemblies. We took the box of parts with us and one of us would assemble while the other drove. We got paid 4 cents for each one. 5000 assemblies, 200 bucks. Woo-hoo!  In the middle of Iowa, our car engine started sputtering. Had to stop for the night. No money for a hotel. My brother in law knew some people in Cedar Rapids and we stayed at their house.  He made some comment like, “Hey I thought a young sales exec like yourself was supposed to be earning big commissions.” Bit my lip. Built screw assemblies and watched TV.

Took an extra day for somebody to fix the fuel filter. Had to call my boss & explain why I wasn’t coming into work that day. One more step closer to getting the boot.

Who’s gonna hire a sales guy who’s been at it for 2 years and hasn’t hardly sold anything? What engineering company is going to hire an engineer who’s left engineering and spent the last 2 years in sales?

DANG. THIS TOTALLY SUCKS. I felt totally, completely trapped.

Fast forward 6 months.

It’s 6:30 in the evening on a freezing cold January night in Chicago. Everyone else has gone home. There’s only 2 people in the office, me and my new boss Mike. It’s been a good sales day. I’ve just gotten my December check and it’s the biggest commission of my life.

I’m going to be late getting home from work. . . but Laura’s not going to be upset with me this time. I know that when I come in the office tomorrow there’s going to be more fresh hot sales leads waiting. More opportunities, more adventure.

The conversation Mike’s having with me is: “OK Perry, so what do we need to do to get you to stick around???”

In 180 days my life had done a complete 180.

I’m saying to myself: “Self, you and I sure could get used to this. Are you sure this is really happening?”

Yes, it was really happening. There were no words for the elation I felt. And it was only the beginning of a new and rewarding season. Of finally being useful to somebody, finding my groove, and digging myself out of the giant hole I’d created.

Last week I did a conference call with Drayton Bird, the great UK advertising legend. He said, “Good times breed bad habits. Bad times breed good habits.” How true.

It was at that low point in Iowa that I finally began to throw the useless cargo off the ship.

It didn’t *seem* useless at the time. But it was holding me back. When you begin to ask yourself the questions you’ve been afraid to ask, when you start listening to the right people, situations change. And they can change *fast*.

Some people are doing extraordinarily well right now. But admittedly, most people are wrangling with tight credit, reluctant customers and broken systems.

Now is the time to fix those systems. The marketplace is beckoning you to move from where you’ve been to something new… and it’s asking you to do it with existing resources.

The good news is, you aren’t confined to your existing knowledge. Almost every problem you need to solve has already been solved by somebody else, somewhere. Within the existing resources you have is some new configuration that offers 10X more value to others than what you’re doing now.

Within your reach is someone for whom your skills and your offerings are highly prized.

The other good news is, you only have to get about 5-10% of it perfect. A handful of the right ingredients can create a huge success story. The rest can wait.

And here’s something you can ABSOLUTELY take to the bank:

While the rest of the world roils in chaos and waits for “something to happen”, we proactive alchemists are quietly re-engineering our offerings, our systems and our priorities. We’re still reeling in customers because we’re focusing on the core essentials.

We’re not listening to the whiners. We’re not reading the morning paper. We’re rising up in the morning and focusing on what’s POSITIVE. We’re building on what’s GOOD.

Today is August 6. On February 6, 2011 you can look back on your 180 day 180. My friend, you win in the end. IF you ask yourself the right questions. IF.

Don’t be afraid of those questions. And don’t let anyone steal your victory. It will be yours to keep and celebrate forever.”

Wow….I hope you enjoyed that and were as inspired as was when I read that. I haven’t edited ONE word that Perry wrote…it was so powerful.

Staying stuck in the way you were doing business before this recession and HOPING the economy turns around and your business becomes profitable, viable, or just even fun again is not a strategy. I hope you’ll take action on what Perry had to say here: Embrace change, ask the right questions of the right people and TAKE action.

At thirdRiver, we do more than just web design and social media, we help businesses do 180′s…so, if you’re ready to throw your useless cargo off the ship and are ready to create new systems and processes for attracting clients…we’re here to help.

Here’s to an awesome 180 days!

If you’d like more information about Perry Marshall, you can check him out here, http://www.perrymarshall.com/ .

While it can be a lot of fun (and silly) on a personal level to be social and to keep up with friends on Facebook and other similar sites, from a business perspective, you really should decide how to be intentional about who you connect with and how you interact.  I thought I’d share just a few thoughts about things that we have done that has made a big difference in our business and, most importantly, has brought us new leads and buyers.

1. Decide what you want to be known for and what your potential connections want to hear;  this determines what you put on your profile(s), who you connect with, and what type of content you post.  For example, one of the things we like to be known for is that we’re passionate about using WordPress.  WordPress is the platform that we build almost all of our web sites on (including ours).  Subsequently, I have that in my various profiles.

2.  Use tools to find people who need your expertise;  One of the tools we use all the time is Twitter Search.  You can search, real time, for conversations happening on Twitter around your area of expertise.  For example, we have a query setup in Twitter Search that monitors people looking for help with WordPress.  Here is a recent screen shot;

The two highlighted questions represent an opportunity to demonstrated our WordPress expertise and potentially generate a lead for our business services.  You or an assistant can monitor this and respond very quickly since this is real time. Imagine the power of getting an answer almost immediately. This strategy alone has resulted in a lot of work for our company.

3. Add yourself to directories or groups; Another way to be intentional about who you connect to on the social networking sites is to use directories and groups.  For example, consider joining Twellow.com, the Twitter Yellow Pages.  Or, consider joining, or even better, creating a group on Linkedin.

4. Create a Facebook fan page for your business;   We do a lot of speaking on the topic of social networking to business groups.  One of the things we always do is ask who in the room has various different profiles such as Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter.  While almost everybody in the room has a Facebook profile, many fewer people have a fan page.  Having your own fan page is a great way to see people who have ‘raised their hands’ and said they like your company.  You can then be very specific about the messages and content you post on the fan page, making it all about your business.

These are just some of the ways you can be intentional about social networking (or as I like to call it social media marketing) to generate new leads.  Be intentional, and it will pay off.

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Tim Fahndrich is the co-founder of the Third River, an Oregon-based Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Intentional word-of-mouth marketing is a great way to generate more leads

As business owners we can all generally benefit from more traffic and leads coming in the door or to our web site.  How can we generate more leads?  How about being more intentional about word-of-mouth referrals?

Most business owners will tell you that referrals account for the bulk of their new leads.  I have people tell me that all the time. Ok, that is great!  But, it can get better!  Here’s how;

1. Be intentional about referral systems; Instead of just ‘letting it happen’ …

• Setup marketing systems that keeps your name top of mind to your existing clients
• Create a client loyalty or rewards program
• Look for intentional referral, networking, or joint venture partners (which I’ll talk about in more detail in another article)
• ASK! for the referral … a step so many of us forget

2.  Engage casual referrals to become leads;  Many times when you ask a friend or colleague for a referral, you might receive a couple names to check out.  When this happens to a prospective client of yours … what do you do to engage them and turn them into a lead?  A great place to start is on your web site.  When I hear people talk about all the referrals they get, I often ask them “Yes, but do you know how many you are missing?”.   If you’re not offering an opportunity to connect or engage with you … you might miss them forever.

We’ll talk more about specific ways to do this in future articles.

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Tim Fahndrich is the co-founder of the Third River, an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

What are the 5 strategies?

1. Generate more leads: What are you doing to generate more traffic (online and off) and leads for your business?  How are you getting more people to notice your company and raise their hand to say “yes, I’d like to know more?”  Until they become an actual lead, they are just suspects.

2.  Increase your conversion rate:  You can have all the leads in the world, but if you never convert them into a buyer, you will forever have hobby, not a business (and I might add, an expensive hobby at that).  What are you doing to increase your conversion and turning leads into buyers?

3.  Increase the buying frequency:  How many times does your average customer buy from you in a given month, year, etc?   You’ve probably heard the phrase “anybody can sell something once, but getting the repeat buyer is the key”.   What are some ways that you turn buyers into repeat buyers?

4. Increase the average dollar sale:  Have you ever bought something on impulse that was strategically positioned at the checkout counter?  I know I have?  Why, because the retailer knows how to increase the average sale by upselling.  What are some ways in your business that you could increase the amount of money your customer spends on average?

5. Increase profit margin: Do you know what products or services contribute the most profit to your bottom line?  There might be some areas of your business that you need to eliminate, and others that you need to increase so that your profit margin can go up, even if it is just a few percentage points.

What happens if you make small improvements in each of these areas?  Well, let’s look at an example:

Wow!  In this simple example, when you increase all five of these components by just 25%, you increase your profit by 305%!

So how is this done?  Over the next month or so we will be talking about 31 specific strategies to help you in each of these areas.    So be sure to stay tuned and we’d love to hear your comments and questions as well.  These are all great marketing and business makeover strategies.

If you’d like help with a marketing makeover, be sure to give us a call.  You can reach Tim Fahndrich @ 503.581.4554 or David Chandler @ 503.816.6350.

When we started out with the marketing makeover, we had several distinct goals;

• update Matt’s logo, branding and web site
• improve search results and overall visibility online
• create an improved social media marketing strategy and coordinated branding approach
• set up systems to create more leads and more referrals
• position Matt as the fun, hip wedding entertainer that he his (but that his old branding did not reflect)

We unveiled the makeover last week when we hosted the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce Greeters. Thank you to everybody who attended.  I think it is safe to say everybody had a good time.

Here is a screenshot of his old site:

And here is a screenshot of his new website, live now at OregonWeddingDJs.com:

We worked with Signworks of Oregon to create new branding.  We wanted to create a new look that was hip and created a ‘nightclub’ and entertainment feel immediately.  We’re really pleased with the result.   You can see the new logo below;

We also had a new publicity photo taken by Cherie Renae, a Salem photography studio.  She did a great job capturing Matt’s fun and playful side.  Here is the picture we used on his new site;

This marketing makeover really allowed us to demonstrate the depth of services that we can provide for our clients.  It had a lot of features, including;

• new branding and photos
• custom built web site, built on the WordPress platform
• marketing video
• search engine optimization (this is an ongoing thing that we’ll be working on with Matt)
• Q&A marketing system
• new or revamped Social Media Marketing including Facebook, Twitter, and Youtube channels
• Twitter and Facebook marketing system designed to provide value and get more leads
• radio show featured wedding experts
• ability to broadcast weddings live over the internet for those not able to attend  the wedding
• lead generation tools
• and more…

A big thanks goes out to the team at Signworks of Oregon, Cherie Renae, and of course Matt Bixby.

If you’d like your own marketing makeover, give us a call at 503.581.4554.   We handle marketing makeovers from small to extreme and everything in between.

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Tim Fahndrich is the president of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

We’re so excited to be able to host the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce Greeters tomorrow morning and unveil the marketing makeover we’ve been working on for Matt’s Entertainment.  Come join the party!  Matt will be there with Friday morning ‘get up and go’ music, and Kurt Spingath will be serving his amazing Belgian Sugar Waffles.

There’s a lot to do yet, so I need to get back to work.  We hope to see you there!

Special thanks go out to Signworks of Oregon and Cherie Renae Studios for their contribution to the project.

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Tim Fahndrich is the president of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

The last couple of days we’ve been working on the following main areas;

1.  Branded social media setup;   One of THE most important things that businesses should be doing in today’s marketplace is building a social media marketing strategy.  We believe in taking an integrated and branded approach for our clients, so we’ve been setting up new social media channels for Matt including Twitter and Youtube that will connect his brand with his audience, both prospect and clients, and allow him to continue building the all important “Know, like, and trust” factor.

2. Local search;  As part of his makeover, we’ve done some important research to find local keywords that people are using in Matt’s industry.  A local search keyword is the ‘what’ and the ‘where’ that somebody might be using to find his company.  A good example would be ‘Salem Oregon wedding dj’.

Did you know that over 40% of all online searches have local intent?  That means that people are using the ‘what’ and the ‘where’ to find local businesses to connect with.  With this in mind, we are working on several ways to get Matt listed on the front page of Google for these local search keywords.  This can take some time, but we’re hoping to have a listing or two on the front page by Friday.

3. Radio show; One of the ‘out of the box’ ideas we’ve brought to the table for Matt is to have is own wedding radio show.  We want to position him as an expert in his industry (which he is) and provide a lead generation tool.  When we presented Matt with the idea of having his own show , his first thought was “What am I going to talk about?”.   Content creation is always a concern, but here’s how we’re approaching it with Matt.  Instead of feeling like he has to provide all the content, he is going to be inviting local wedding vendors, such as videographers, photographers, caterers, etc. to be guests on his show.  He will simply do the interviewing, but the cool thing is that his name and his brand will always be in front of the listening audience.  His listeners will gain valuable ideas, best practices, and more about how to have a great wedding, and Matt will get new leads.  With the show, people will be able to tune in live and also subscribe to the podcast via iTunes.  Pretty cool, huh!

Well, we still have a lot to do by Friday morning … but this has been fun so far!  Hope to see you Friday!

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Tim Fahndrich is the president and Chief Relationship Officer of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Today we are working on two main areas;

1.  Video Creation;   One of the most effective ways to engage with your online audience and to create better search engine rankings is with the use of video.  Today we’re working on a short marketing video for Matt that focuses on his wedding clients and their guests having a great time at the wedding.  We’ll be able to post this video on Matt’s new web site, YouTube, and other sites.

Here’s some interesting statistics about online video ads according to a recent study:

• 80% of web users have seen an online video ad
• 52% took action after viewing the ad
• 31% visited the advertisers web site
• 22% searched for additional info about the product or service
• 15% visited the advertisers store or place of business
• 12% made a purchase
• PLUS, 16% talked to friends and family about the product / service
• 9% forwarded it or shared it with their friends and family

Powerful?  Definitely!

2. Final design decisions;  Over the weekend we took the layout that we had decided on last week and created some mockup designs of the new web site and what it would look like with Matt’s new branding and color styles.  This allows him to visually see it all in place before we actually start the final design process for the web site code.  Together we selected the best look and now we’re off to final coding.

Oh … the photo session was today; We’re really excited to see the new publicity photos from Cherie Renae of Cherie Renae Studios.  They got together today for a photo shoot.  Thanks Cherie!

Whew!  It’s starting to really come together … stay tuned for more… and mark your calendars for Greeters, April 9th, at the Northern Lights Theater Pub, 8:30am for the unveiling.

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Tim Fahndrich is the president and Chief Relationship Officer of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Today we are working on three main areas;

1.  Layout;   One of the main things people think about when doing a new web site is the design.  What is it going to look like?  What will the layout be?  Here are some of the questions we typically ask our clients when doing a full-blown web site;

1. • What are some of your favorite web sites?  Why?
   • Do you have a particular style or theme you are looking for?
   • What types of information do you want to include on the site?
   • Do you have a preference for the layout of the header or logo, menu, body of the page, etc?
   • Would you like a sidebar column?
   • What do you want in the background?

However, as important as these layout-related questions are … we believe that they pale in comparison to this important question – “What do you want the web site to do?“  You see at the end of the day, it’s not really about the web site design at all.  Yes, we all want it to look good, and we make sure that it does … but it is more important that the web site serves a marketing purpose and causes the customer to take action.

We have seen so many people get caught up in the exact details of what a web site looks like … when in fact we should be spending our energy in the marketing aspects of getting visitors to the site, and then turning those visitors into leads (or connections), leads into buyers, buyers into repeat buyers, and repeat buyers into raving fans … that go on to tell a lot of other people about your business.

Today as we began thinking about Matt’s needs, his re-branding efforts, and what he wants to accomplish with his site, we did some searching for some website ‘themes’ that would work for his needs.  We found a great option and sent it off to Matt to get his feedback.  He and his wife Kim reviewed it and both of them loved it.  So, what we’ll be doing from here is to begin customizing it with Matt’s new branding, colors, and specific needs for his site.

2.  Content;  One of the things we’ve asked Matt to come up with is the top questions his prospects and clients ask.  So, Matt has been busy coming up with the questions and the answers.  We’re going to be using those in a variety of ways on his site.  We also began the discussion today about pictures and videos … what does he have in his media library right now that could be used on the site?

For our clients that don’t have access to good media files of their own, there are a ton of great resources online.  Our favorite photo resource is iStockPhoto.com.  For audio, we like either iStockPhoto.com or AudioMicro.com.

3. Photo Shoot; We were excited to be able to schedule Matt for his publicity photo shoot with Cherie Renae of Cherie Renae Studios.  Cherie takes wonderful photos and we can’t wait to see how they turn out!  We’ll be using his new publicity photo on Matt’s new web site, his marketing materials, social media profiles, and more.  Thanks Cherie!

Ok, that’s it for now.  More to come …

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Tim Fahndrich is the president and Chief Relationship Officer of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Today we are working on three main areas;

1. Finalizing the branding;   We have new branding!  The design team at Signworks of Oregon, John and Jeff, did a great job working with Matt to finalize the branding including a new logo and color style for Matt’s Entertainment.  It was important to Matt to convey a fun, contemporary brand that utilized modern colors, look and feel, and a clear sense of what he provides … and we are all very excited with what we ended up with. (Can’t wait to share)
2. Homework for Matt;  Yes, we do give out homework when we begin a marketing project. Why? Because we feel like it is important to get inside our client’s minds and that they know their business much better than we do … so we try to bring out some key concepts and guidelines for content that will be used on the web site.  So yes, Matt has been busy!
3. Domain setup;  Yesterday we purchased a keyword-based domain name, and today we set it up with a hosting account.  A domain name is your online address (ie yourname.com), and a hosting account is where your web site files (pages, pictures, forms, etc) are located.  Setting up the domain with a hosting account makes the web site accessible to the world.  BUT, we can’t tell you where it is yet … you’ll have to wait until April 9th.

Stay tuned to this channel…

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Tim Fahndrich is the president and Chief Relationship Officer of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Today is day one of the Extreme Marketing Makeover project that we are doing for Matt’s Entertainment, an Oregon wedding entertainment company. We notified Matt yesterday that he had won, and to say that he was excited is, well, an understatement.

Today we are working on three main areas;

1. Discovery;   We like to get to know our clients and their business before we start the project.  Going through a set of marketing interview questions, we discover key services/products, strengths, and opportunities that a business has.  This is the foundation of what we’re doing and helps us formulate a marketing plan that will have the most impact for the client.
2. Research;  We took the information that Matt gave us above and did some keyword analysis and research.  Keywords are the search words and phrases that people use to do a search on Google, Yahoo, Bing, and other search engines.  The analysis involves looking at the volume of searches, the number of search results, and the makeup of the search results.  What we end up looking for is a “buying” keyword that also has a domain name available.  The more defined a keyword is, the more qualified the search is.    We selected a domain for Matt’s Entertainment and will announce it on April 9th.
3. Branding; Actually, we began the branding discussion yesterday almost immediately after we announced the winner.  Moving forward on the marketing web site that we will be building hinges on having the logo and color style in place, so we got on a conference call with Matt as well as John over at SignWorks of Oregon and began mapping out what we wanted the new look to be like.  In Matt’s case, he has recently gone through a personal “image makeover”, working with an image consultant.  So now it is perfect timing for this “Marketing Makeover”.  We set goals of creating new branding that is modern, contemporary, and hip to fit into this new image.  We expect to have the new logo and colors in place by the end of today.

That’s what we’re doing for day one.  We’re really excited about this project and the impact it will have on Matt’s business.  We’ll be keeping you posted … so stay tuned.

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Tim Fahndrich is the president and Chief Relationship Officer of The Third River, Inc., an Oregon Internet Marketing company.    He is passionate about people, marketing, and technology and loves helping businesses and organizations harness the power of the web. You can follow Tim on Twitter here or contact him at 503.581.4554.

Update 3/29/10: We have a winner!  Matt’s Entertainment of Albany.  Be sure to follow our Makeover Updates here

Is your business (or one that you know) in need of a marketing makeover?   The Third River, Inc. is excited to announce the Extreme Business Marketing Makeover: Salem Edition program!

Why are we doing this? We’re hosting the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce “Greeters” on April 9th, 2010.  In order to fully showcase the range of our services, we need more time than the 15 minutes allotted at Greeters.  So, we’d like to bless one local company with a complete marketing face-lift designed to help grow their business and showcase the range of services we can provide.   We will unveil the new look and marketing strategies at Greeters on April 9th.

If you are selected, here is what you’ll receive;

• A new company logo and color style (provided by Sign Works of Oregon)
  • PLUS, Sign Works is throwing in 500 business cards and 250 postcards with your new logo!
• A new keyword domain address and free hosting for 1 year
• A semi-custom marketing web site branded for your company, including
  • your new logo and color style
  • up to 5 pages of content
  • a built-in blog
  • integration with social media
  • a lead generation form to capture email addresses
  • easy-to-use content editing system which allows you to easily change the web site
• Social media marketing package
  • Branded Twitter profile and marketing package
  • Facebook Fan page
  • Linkedin Profile
  • Viral marketing loop
  • YouTube channel
• A new publicity photo for the owner(s) (provided by Cherie Renae Studios)
• Local search optimization for your primary keyword and 2 secondary keywords
• Local directory listings (ie Google Local, Yahoo Local, Bing Local)
• A short <2 minute video showcasing your business
• Your own broadcasting station
  • internet radio channel
    • one audio interview turned into a podcast
  • live internet TV channel
• A social media press release
• A mobile marketing campaign

Co-Sponsors:

Terms & Conditions:

• You must be a current member of the Salem Area Chamber of Commerce,  Salem Business Builders, or Keizer Chamber of Commerce to apply
• The winner will be chosen by The Third River, Inc. based on a number of criteria.
• You must be able to be present at Greeters on April 9th.
• This is not a custom “web design”.  We will use our experience and marketing best practices to build a marketing web site and integrated marketing strategies designed to help you grow your business.
• You must be available for an initial interview on or around March 29th and be able to work with our marketing team in a very timely manner between March 29th – April 9th.
• This will not replace your existing web site, unless you choose to do so after the unveiling on April 9th.
• By your nomination, you give The Third River, Inc. permission to use your name, company name and brand in the marketing makeover and all related marketing efforts done by The Third River, Inc.

Timeline:

• Nominations will be received through Friday, March 26th, 2010.
• The selected company will be announced on Monday March 29th, 2010.
• Between March 29th and April 9th, our marketing team will work with the selected company to design and implement the Business Marketing Makeover.
• The Marketing Makeover will be unveiled during Greeters on April 9th, 2010.

So when I was approached over the holidays about a new company called ShopBest.com, I decided, reluctantly, to take a look at it in detail and see if it was just another shiny little object passing over my desk, or if actually passed my “Opportunity Filter” and was something that I felt I could share with others in my circle of influence.

>>>>> If you are just ready to start getting cash back on your online purchase, go now to ShopBest.com <<<<<< (Please note, this is an affiliate link.  If you make a purchase through the link, we will get paid)

I must admit, at first glance I was not interested in the least.  ShopBest.com looked like another ‘me too’ product offering in the way too crowded world of ‘click and save’ online shopping malls.  It reminded me immediately of a recent product launch of an online shopping mall / portal called Blastoff , which, quite frankly, I wasn’t interested in either.

So let’s begin our review about the company with a discussion about online Affiliate Marketing.  Many people have heard of affiliate marketing, but most do not understand it.  Amazon.com is one of the pioneers in the industry, and they offer the ability for just about anyone with a web site to make money by promoting their products.  I have been around the affiliate marketing industry since 1996, when I was one of the charter merchants with a company called Linkshare.  Here’s a brief video that explains how affiliate marketing works;

So affiliate marketing is a simple way to earn some extra cash by doing what Joel says, “selling other people’s stuff”.  Thousands and thousands of online merchants have affiliate programs.  I believe they are a great way to help grow sales as a merchant, and can become another income stream the little guy. The challenge is that in reality, it isn’t as simple as it sounds.  Here’s why:

a) As a web site owner (commonly called a publisher),  you have to drive the prospective buyer to the merchant’s web site through a special affiliate link on your web site.  However, in most cases, online shoppers already have their favorite merchants that they shop at, such as HomeDepot.com, Dell.com, Macys.com, or BestBuy.com, and they will usually just go directly to that site when they want to buy something.

b) Traditional affiliate programs rely entirely on the efforts of each individual affiliate.  This can be difficult if a person lacks online marketing experience … heck, it can be difficult even for experienced online marketers.  So it can be tough to make any real money.  So while I am a huge fan of affiliate marketing, it can definitely be more difficult than most people want to admit or spend their time on.

ShopBest.com changes this in a very innovative way.  It is setup as an affiliate program of sorts, except for the fact that they’ve done all the heavy lifting for you.

1. They’ve setup the affiliate relationships with thousands of merchants so that you don’t have to.
2. Instead of having to have a web site to publish the affiliate links, you simply have to download a ShopBest.com toolbar.  This toolbar installation takes about 3 minutes and tracks shopping activity at all of the participating merchants.  Even if you turn your toolbar off, it still tracks the shopping activity and rewards you cash back points.
3. The toolbar has built-in tools to be able to share it with others via your favorite social media links… so it is not a difficult process to setup affiliate links, etc.
4. You don’t need to rely on just your efforts.  You can share the toolbar with others … and get a percentage of their transactions as well.  This is where it starts to get really interesting.

The second thing you need to know about ShopBest.com is that it is set up as a network marketing company, which in a simple way is an affiliate program, but just with multiple levels of payout.  Now, I am a very cautious fan of the network marketing model.  There are so many fallacies and problems in most of the programs out there that most people don’t think about, including some of my favorites below:

• “anybody can do it” – not true… it takes hard work, the right mindset, and tremendous dedication to make anything work
  
• “everybody needs this” (ie their product or service) – again, not true
• “you can make tons of money” – some people have, but the vast majority of network marketers struggle to break even
• “we’re going to be bigger than Google” – this is one of my favorites … often stated before the company even launches by unknowing distributors.  How do you know you’re going to be bigger than Google? Do you realize how big Google is and how much they are worth?
  
• premium prices which are way more than most people would pay for the product – very common
• a complete change of buying habits in order to participate – customers and distributors usually have to completely change their buying habits to take part in the business

So while the model does have a lot of problems with it … it also has some real strengths as well.  It is definitely a model that provides leverage, and given the right product, can be a valid way of doing business.  In fact, it can even redefine entire industries.  One network marketing company that we believe in and promote is SendOutCards.  It is a great product and actually makes it easier and usually less expensive to send greeting cards to your friends, family, and business clients.

Back to Shopbest.  Here’s what I like about it:

1. You can benefit from it without spending a dime. There is no upfront cost or monthly fee to use the basic Toolbar.  You can simply download the toolbar, shop online at your favorite participating online merchants (there are over 1800), and you will get cash back points.  When you earn the equivalent of $15 or more,  you will actually get a check in the mail.  Once installed, you can basically ‘set it and forget it’ and it is still working for you.
2. It doesn’t force people to change their buying habits if you’re already shopping online. You don’t have to go to a specific ‘portal’ or ‘online mall’ to start your shopping.  Just download and install the toolbar, and the system takes care of the rest.  Quite frankly, I already have my established portals, social networks, etc… I don’t want another one.
3. There are no inflated pricing models. You shop directly at your favorite online merchants’ web sites.  Plus, there are often super saver deals that can potentially save you even more money.
4. You can start earning additional cash back points when you share the toolbar with others.
5. If you want to share the toolbar with lots of folks, there is an affiliate marketing opportunity that allows you to make even more money.

Here’s what I’m not going to tell you about ShopBest.com;

• It’s going to be bigger than Google: I have no clue how big it will be, but it does look like they have done pretty innovative things and could become a big company.
• You can make save gobs of money by earning cash back and taking advantage of the super saver deals that the merchants make available:  I can’t tell you that because I don’t know what your shopping habits are now.  While many of my friends shop online at least for some things, some prefer to only shop locally.  Being actively involved in my local chamber of commerce, I am a fan of that as well, but there are some things that I definitely buy online on a regular basis due to convenience and pricing.
• You can make a million dollars this year:  I can’t tell you how much you are going to make if you sign up as an affiliate.  I’m not going to promise you the moon.  I’m not going to talk about islands in the Caribbean that you’ll be able to visit at your leisure because you were in ‘early’ and are now part of the ‘billionaire’ club.  I can’t promise you anything.  I can only point you to the income calculator on the site … and let you determine if it is worth it for you and your family.
• Your kids can become millionaires by the end of the year.  (cool, sign me up right!)
• In case you’re wondering … I’ve heard all of these over and over again about other recent ‘opportunities’.

Closing thoughts:

If you shop online at all, it probably makes sense to download the free ShopBest.com Toolbar.  It takes about 3 minutes to download and install.  You can set it and forget it.

If you’re looking for ways to make additional money in 2010, check out the videos and the earnings calculator on the ShopBest.com web site to see the eight different ways the company allows you to make money by sharing this free toolbar with others.  For me, it fit my opportunity filter.

Here’s to a fantastic 2010.

But, I kept hearing the term … so I decided to check it out and find out what it really means.  And boy am I glad I did.

You see, I’m a very visual person, and if you’re anything like me, you’ve got way too many ideas floating around in your head and far too many things to do that won’t fit on your standard linear “to-do” list.  That means my productivity suffers sometimes, as I can’t quite keep track of it all and easily get distracted.

Now I’ve been through all of the day-planning seminars over the years to try to get my life organized … but to be honest I still struggle with staying on task in any organized fashion and yet still capturing all of my ideas into a cohesive action plan.

Enter the mindmap.

The mindmap is basically a piece of software that allows you to organize your thoughts, things that you need to do, and even business systems into a visual format.  You can see an example below;

(** We are an affiliate of DiscoverFreeMind.com and receive a commission if you purchase their mindmap video training course)

I was talking with a potential JV partner today and explained some of my process with him.  I told him I was a “recovering opportunity addict” (I’m a work in progress) … which generated a good laugh from the other end of the line.  I know a lot of people have been there… I know I have.  Things come along that look really good and so we jump head first without thinking … and usually regret it later.

Here are a couple of questions I ask as part of my opportunity filter.  It could apply to network marketing opportunities (I’m sure you’ve never been approached right), online marketing “secrets”, or other types of business ventures;

Q:  Is it part of my core business offering or would it require a totally different skill set than I have right now?

Focus.  That is a good word.   This doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ever take the opportunity to expand your horizons (sometimes this CAN be a good thing) … but you really need to think long and hard before doing so.  Otherwise you are going to stretch yourself too thin and ultimately will not feel like you are reaching your goals.

By focusing on areas that are within your core competency, you will most likely be able to build a much more effective, profitable business and one that meets your goals and lifestyle needs.

Q: Ask the person promoting the opportunity this question – “if you never made a dime from selling “x” (the product or service), would you still promote it to your closest friends and family?”

This is a great question!

In other words – be sure that they (and ultimately you) believe in the product itself, not just the opportunity to sell it and make money from it.

Let me give you an example.  We represent a company called SendOutCards.  It provides a service that allows you to quickly and easily send real, send-through-the-U.S.-mail greeting cards through the internet.  I love this service!!  It is convenient, inexpensive, flexible, and people love to get real cards from us (especially in this electronic age).

Hopefully when you ask this question, you get a resounding “YES!” as the answer, just like I feel about SendOutCards.

Q: Are you saying “yes” to an opportunity only because you’re afraid of what you might miss out on?

This is a bad reason to say yes.  Taking on a new project, business, or opportunity should be something you really want to do and can get passionate about, not something you feel badly about saying no to or because you think you might miss out on something.  If it’s a good opportunity and it fits your other criteria, it will still be available when you are ready.

Q: Do you already have umpteen “opportunities” that you’ve already started and not finished.

Opportunity addicts are always looking for the magic bullet, the “secret”, or the latest, greatest, bestest way to make money.  Trust me – I’ve been there and am still there every day.  I see stuff come across my desk that makes sense and I think to myself – “oooh, that looks good”.  My friend Jennifer Powers calls it the “shiny little object” syndrome.

That is why it is extremely important to ask yourself these questions when presented with opportunities.  Otherwise, you will just have a stack of projects, tools, systems, opportunities and unrealized goals sitting on your desk.

Q: Does it align with your values and core beliefs of how you’d like to be treated?

This is one of the most important questions you can ask.  Again, I see lots of things come across my desk.  Sometimes, I just want to shut off the noise and all the hype.  I mean c’mon people – do you really believe that if I just buy into your opportunity or “system” that I can make $77 million this next year?  Really??  I mean it says ‘anyone’ can do it right!

If you get turned off by the marketing of an opportunity … it probably doesn’t make sense for you to turn around and market it yourself.

I learned this the hard way this past year.  I had received an email inviting me to promote a particular online marketing system.   The story was an interesting and somewhat inspiring one … but it used a lot of hype to get people excited about it.

Well, I sent it out to my list … and it didn’t take long to get an angry email back from one of my loyal subscribers … I had hooked her with the subject / headline … but totally turned her off with the offer.  When I revisited what I had sent out … I realized that I would not have liked to have been treated that way.

These are just a few of the questions I ask myself.  I would highly recommend that you come up with your own opportunity filter to help guide your decisions each and every day.

So what are some ways that we might be able to gain some instant leverage?  I subscribe to a newsletter by an Internet Marketer named Yanik Silver.  A while back he sent out a one page diagram that outlined four distinct methods to create leverage.  I figured now was a good time to review it for my own business and thought I’d share a few of the basics here.

1. Transactional opportunities to increase sales; things like upselling and cross-selling, thank you emails, and continuity programs.
2. Your Existing database; prospects, past customers, and referral sources
3. Analyze existing areas of your business for possible leverage; can you license something? do you own any web sites that can be sponsored?  Could you start earning referral fees for recommending a product or service?
4. Pricing; ahh, the age old question of pricing.  The tempation in a down economy is to lower your pricing (I know I’m guilty of that)… but that doesn’t provide any leverage.  Instead, perhaps you should raise your prices, or create some tiers (good, better, best).

I hope this helps you to start thinking of possible ways to create leverage in your business.  I know I’m looking forward to going through this with a fine-toothed comb and gaining every bit of leverage I can to improve cash flow and profits.

A wise friend of mine said to me the other day, “Tim, I’m really excited about the friction that you are experiencing in your business right now”.   Why?  Because through the challenges we will only become stronger as we learn to create better systems and more leverage.

If you’d like to explore leverage points in your business, I’d love to have a cup of coffee with you or talk on the phone.  Together we can probably improve both of our businesses.  Give me a call at 503.581.4554.

In fact, I ran into someone the other day who asked if I was related to him … an old customer of his from well over 10 years ago … and they fondly related how much they always appreciated him and his friendly service.

Here are the words on this old, faded sheet of paper:

What is a customer?

A customer is the most important person in any business.

A customer is not dependent on us. We are dependent of him.

A customer is not an interruption of our work.  He is the purpose of it.

A customer does us a favor when he comes in.  We aren’t doing him a favor by waiting on him.

A customer is part of our business – not an outsider.  A customer is not just money in the cash register. He is a human being with feelings and deservers to be treated with respect.

A customer is a person who comes to us with his needs and his wants. It is our job to fill them.

A customer deserves the most courteous attention we can give him.  He is the lifeblood of this and every business.  He pays your salary.  Without him we would have to close our doors.  Don’t ever forget it.

Thanks dad, for the reminder today.