NOVEMBER 2010
Greetings & Salutations:
Last month I sent out an email asking you what you wanted
to see in this eLetter.
By and large, most responses wanted more personal information
from my experiences - so - I went back into my archives
and retrieved a bunch of questions I have fielded in the past,
along with my answers.
Here they are ...
Q: How old
are you?
A:Just 2 years
older than dirt. -- When I was in the Army, SGT Dirt and I had
the same birthday - but - I was 2 years older.
Q: Where are
you from?
A: Born
in Oklahoma. Reared on poor dirt farms in Oklahoma, Missouri
and Kansas.
Q: How
many years have you been marketing?
A: Over
50 years.
Q: How
many weeks a year would you say you spend working now?
A: Just 52 ...
there aren't any more.
Q:: Please
list 3 of your greatest marketing success's. Detail as
much about them as possible. From how did you get involved into
it, how did you market for that product and through what you
learned through the process.
A: I haven't
had any "great" marketing success ... like so many
of the one-time wonders. I have just developed a stable
of products and kept selling them. No homeruns ... just
single & double baggers that have continued to produce income.
Q: Please
list 3 of your greatest marketing blunders. Detail as much
about them as possible.
A: I can count
my successes on my fingers & toes - but - I couldn't count
my blunders using all the hairs on my chest. -- Without
blunders, mistakes and failures there can be no success.
You only learn from your mistakes ... success doesn't teach
you anything. Show me a person who is afraid to fail
and I will show you a person who will never succeeed.
Q: List
your greatest marketing achievements (this need not be detailed
but it should be in list format for it will be used to assert
you as an authority in marketing).
A: My
career has progressed through direct selling, service contracting,
wholesale merchandising, entertainment (I was a professional
Trumpet player, vocalist & Radio Announcer), freight forwarding,
import/export, retail merchandising, warehousing, real estate,
electronics manufacturing, finder's fees, closeout merchandising,
financial brokerage, business consulting, steel fabrication,
gold & coal mining, offshore banking, mailorder, writing,
and publishing.
Over the past 40 years, I have written well over 700 books, booklets,
manuals, reports, courses and articles about doing business --
all based on my own personal, hands-on experience. My writings
are "specific" methods, techniques and approaches to
doing business that anyone can use to start or expand their business.
As a direct marketer, I have produced revenues of over four-hundred
million dollars ($400,000,000) worth of products and services
... everything from Beauty Supplies to Heavy Equipment ... Burglar
Alarms to Sleeping Bags ... Fishing Lures to Women's Wigs ...
Automobiles to Wheelchairs ... Investment Opportunities to Seafood
... Consulting Services to "How To" Courses. -- Today,
I am making a new ... even bigger ... fortune on the Internet.
Q: What
did you do before you became a marketer?
A: I had
to learn how to read and write. Started selling as soon
as I was big enough to walk into town on my own.
Q:: How
did you first get invloved in marketing
A: When I was
about 9 years old, I started selling Cloverleaf Salve door to
door in our small midwestern town of 1,000 population.
Sold "Grit" newspaper, Christmas Cards, Magazine subscriptions.
Q: How
did you make your first dollar in marketing?
A: Knocking
on doors, selling just about anything I could find offered in
the back of Comic Books.
Q: What
was your first experience with a computer?
A: As
a kid, I was an electronics nut. My first computer
experience was a system using tubes and patch panels. What
you now do on a wristwatch, used to take enough equipment
to fill the building we occupy now.
Q: When did
you first start working online, and how did you get involved
in selling within the online community?
A: You
can read the story at: Oct99.html
Q: What
was the first product you marketed online? How did you become
affiliated/interested in that product? Did you make any
profit marketing that initial product? What did you learn
from that initial marketing experience? What would
you say was your first break through product? Any shocking
marketing stories, something unusual ever happen while marketing?
A: Created
my website in September, 1999, when more and more of
my paper & ink readers began asking where they could buy
my stuff online. -- At first it was little more than a
catalog of my products. -- The site had coverd all of its
costs and generated a profit by January, 2000.
All I did, at first, was add my URL to all of my
out-going direct mail pieces. -- Still the best source of new
customers.
Mid-year 2003, I discovered the profits to be made as an affiliate
marketer. -- Until then, I had only sold my
products to my customers. -- Within 3 months after I started
affiliate marketing, I was knocking down a few extra thousand
dollars each week. -- Then, once I knew exactly how it was done
... how anyone could do it ... I wrote my report,
"How You Really Can ... Make Your Internet
Fortune as an Affiliate Marketer!" --
Q: Go through
your average day from waking up in the morning to going in bed
at night (be as thorough as possible).
A: I usually
awaken about 4:30 each morning ... do a little exercise
... then, catch the news.
Finish up all emails ... fill all the orders ...
by about 10:30 a.m. -- Spend the rest of the day searching
for good stuff to tell my readers about ... methods to
use to increase my advertising ... doing the customary paper
work involved in any business ... reading review copies of books
sent to me for my consideration.
I leave the office about 12:00 noon. -- Do any chores
that need to be done. -- Then, I read until about midnight.
Get up the next day and do it all again.
Q: Do
you have a system that you believe is responisble for your success,
a certain making money strategy or model? If so please
describe.
A: I use
the PBOC method. -- I Put my Butt On a Chair until
all of my responsibilities and obligations for the day have been
done.
Q: When you
sit down at the computer what exactly do you do?
A: I turn it
on. Then, I get my emails... fill the orders ...
and answer every email (deleting the crap as I go).
Q: What in your
opinion has been most responsible for your success?
A: I love what
I do and do what I love doing.
Q: How
many different products have you sold online?
A: Oh,
I don't know. Fifteen of my own products and
... since I started as an affiliate marketer ... maybe a couple
dozen more.
Q: Have
you worked in more then one market, if so which?
A: Online
I have only sold business related information products
and services. Over the years, I have been active in hundreds
of different markets.
Q: What
marketing methods have you used in the past and which ones have
worked best for you?
A: If you are asking about Internet marketing
methods, I have tried them all with varying success.
Direct email has proven to be the best ... as I fully
explain in "How You Really Can ... Make
Your Internet Fortune as an Affiliate Marketer!" --
Q: How long
did it take for you to become successful?
A: I have always
been successful ... even my failures have been successful. --
Why? -- Because "success" ... like "poverty"
... is a state of mind.
Q: Where do
you see internet marketing going in the next 5 years? Do you
for see any types of marketing that will cease to work in the
next year or two?
A: It can only
get better and better. It is the greatest advertising medium
ever created.
Q: If someone
where to take everything in the business world away from you
that you have built up until this day what would be the one thing
you would hang on to?
A: As long as
I have the knowledge of my past experience, I have everything
I need.
Q: What
in your opinion has been the one characteristic of your personality
that has beend responsible for your success?
A: A desire
to bring "value" into my customers' lives.
Q: If you had
a chance to do it all over again is there anything you would
have done differently?
A: Yes ... I
would NEVER have any products of my own. I would only sell
other people's products and services. -- I would sell just as
much but without the ongoing hassles.
Q: What
are you currently working on?
A: Trying to
teach people how they really can make money on the Internet.
-- They've been fed so much crap, it is a big job just
trying to get them to unlearn the garbage they have already learned.
That's why I wrote "How You Really Can ... Make
Your Internet Fortune as an Affiliate Marketer!" --
Beyond that, I have written down the methods I have used to
generate fortune after fortune (for ove 50 years) for the younger
generations, so they won't have to learn for themselves how it's
done, as I did, by trial and error. -- My Legacy!
Q: What are
your plans for the future, is there any marketing adventure you
have yet to conquer?
A: I will
keep doing what I'm doing until it isn't fun anymore.
Q: If
a person were to learn just one thing from your experiences what
do you believe that should be?
A: If you are
going to be in business ... be in business.
Quit pretending. Quit trying to get rich overnight
(it never happens). Learn the solid fundamentals of doing
business then apply them to whatever business you are doing.
If you aren't going to learn to do
business. Go get a job and quit cluttering up the
business arena.
Q: Name 3 childhood
leisure activites you used to participate in?
A: Logic puzzles,
chess, bridge.
Q: Name
3 leisure activaties you participate in now?
A: Reading,
reading and reading ... anything about anything ... no fiction.
Q: Do you have
any pets?
A: Just
two black cats; Alex & Felix. They're twins.
Their momma brought them to my office the day they were born
... she left'em ... I took'em home.
Q: If
you could make yourself into any toy/super hero what would it
be?
A: Who, me?
There ain't one good enough.
Q: What do you
usually eat for breakfast?
A: Just coffee.
Q: Do you do
anything unusual in your day?
A: Nothing
unusual ... just do what I do.
Q: Boxers
or Briefs?
A: Depends upon
what I am wearing.
Q: Did you have
any idols or role models growing up as a kid?
A: Don
Amechi & Clayton Moore (voice), Fred Astaire (poise), Vincent
Price & David Niven (class), John Wayne (manhood), Louis
Armstrong (trumpet).
Q: Pepsi or
Coke?
A: Neither
... I prefer coffee.
Q: Advertising
is a key area that many of us need help with ... what are the
main factors to consider in any form of promotion? As always,
there are only three ... Product, Offer & Audience.
A: Rather
than restate what I have already said, you'll find out everything
you need to know about developing your promotions in past issues
of my "Business Lyceum e-Letter" ... such as:
Jun01.html
-- tells you why most marketers miss the mark by 50%.
Jan01.html
-- gives you methods you can use to capture your audience ...
just as they did in 1913.
Oct00.html
-- tells you how anything that works is right.
Feb00.html
-- tells how Unique Selling Propositions can be created.
Nov99.html
-- tells what to do it you don't have any testimonials.
Q: What
famous books on copywriting would you recommend?
A: Anything
written by Dan Kennedy, Melvin Powers or E. Joseph Cossman ...
all of their works are written from hands-on, personal experience;
not research.
Q: We
hear all the time that changing headlines can increase profits.
At what stage do you decide that it is not the headline that
is wrong but the sales letter?
A: You
don't.
In the marketing game, the professional marketer is constantly
testing. -- Sometimes, what works today won't work tomorrow -
and - what worked well yesterday may, of a sudden, work well
again today.
Here's how it's done ...
First, you write a sales piece and test it. -- If it produces
orders, keep it as a "control" ... because you know
from your testing that it produces orders.
If your sales piece does NOT produce orders, you change only
one thing in it and test it again.
The big mistake most beginners make is by testing too many things
at once. -- You'll never know which change made the difference
if you have more than one change in your sales piece.
If your sales piece did work, you still need to be testing against
it ... as your "control" ... to enhance it's pulling
power.
Then again, when a new tested piece produces great gobs of orders,
then quits, it will be time to go back to an older tested piece
that used to sell. -- You never know in this business, until
you test, Test, TEST; then test some more.
Hey ... sometimes you can lose a bundle of money testing and
retesting your headline; your offer; your price; your audience
- BUT - the results can make you rich, Rich, RICH ... when you
find the right combination.
Most beginners just give up too soon.
If you KNOW your product or service is something needed or wanted
in the marketplace, it is worth whatever it costs to find a headline,
offer, price and an audience that works.
PLEASE tell me whether or not you like the above Q&A
format ...
I have literally hundreds of questions and answers I have
given over the years.
If you would like to read more of them, or NOT, please let me
know.
Can you stump the old master? --
Betcha can't!
Over the past 50 years (man and boy), I have made bundles
of money in direct selling, service contracting, wholesale merchandising,
entertainment (I was a professional Trumpet player, vocalist
& Radio Announcer), freight forwarding, import/export, retail
merchandising, warehousing, real estate, electronics manufacturing,
finder's fees, closeout merchandising, financial brokerage, business
consulting, steel fabrication, gold and coal mining, offshore
banking, mailorder, writing, and publishing. -- That being the
case ...
No matter what business you're in ... whether you're just
starting, well on your way, or at the top of the heap ... I've
probably been where you are, done what you are doing. -- So ...
Anytime you have a question about 'how' to do something in
your business - or - if you have any comments about anything
I've said in issues of this e-Letter; or if you want to add your
2 cents worth ... just "ask" me or "tell"
me.
Send your Questions, Comments or 2 Cents Worth
to ...
with "Question" - "Comment"
- or, "2 Cents Worth" in the SUBJECT.
If I, personally, don't have an answer to any question you
may ask, I will contact some of the professionals in your field
of endeavor (I will probably know one or more personally) to
get the real 'skinny' for you.
Note: If you want to ask a question anonymously
just tell me so when you send in the question. -- Nobody but
you and I will know who asked the question.
Copyright - 20010, J.F. (Jim) Straw. All rights reserved.