This was first posted on SundaySEO on August 26 2012 and its reaction warranted wider discussion.
This is Part 1 and Part 2 from September 2 is published in a different thread:
Yes that's a catchy post title and you will have some homework to do:
For the first time, today’s SundaySEO is written and not video recorded as this topic lends itself better to a written post.
In short, today’s SundaySEO is about why you should consider partly or wholly getting out of Internet MarketING while still being an Internet MarketER.
Huh?
Let me explain.
From what I see in online business, there is a MASSIVE - and I mean staggeringly HUGE - difference and divide between non-IM online business and the world we know as 'Internet Marketing'.
When I say non-IM online business, I don’t necessarily mean Amazon, iTunes, Expedia or the Autotraders of the Web but rather middleweights, for instance, like Copyblogger, Appsumo and Scribd, some of which have been mentioned in previous SundaySEOs.
Here’s one of the major problems with the Internet Marketing space that we know (e.g. Clickbank, Warrior Forum, Digital Point and to a lesser degree, Traffic Planet):
To generalise, the non-IM online business regards our IM world as full of hype, lies, scammers and junk products that don’t work - you know the style of pitch I am talking about:
If you watch this interview with Copyblogger founder Brian Clarke, you’ll get a sense of the contempt that the non-IM world has for the typical IM sales page (many of us INSIDE IM feel the same way):
Now whether any of the above infoproducts have merit or not isn't the point I'm making here. It's more the fact that a lot of IM (e.g. WF WSOs and yes I am running a WSO at the moment but for WP functionality, not "how to make $57,000 in 33 minutes without a computer") is in the style of bad infomercial TV:
This is nothing new of course and 'get rich quick' has been around forever.
My point today is that for YOUR online business/es to GROW into REAL powerhouse ventures with real value as digital assets, I urge you to turn your back on this IM scene (if you hadn't already!) and consider an alternative - more on that in a moment.
For me in business and life, I am motivated by 3 forces:
1. Creativity: seeing 'gaps' in markets, creating new products/services/tools/trainings where the current offerings either don't exist or are terrible (can't tell you how many 'Build Your Own WP Plugin Business' type courses I've bought which usually have one sentence on Licensing and Encoding, two of the most difficult and time-consuming aspects of the process).
2. Results: within ethical boundaries, I'm pretty fixated on results and you should be too. Don't judge your online business success by the hours invested but rather the RESULTS gained. A one hour a month time expenditure on iTunes podcasting might yield 1000 x the results of a failed Media Buying campaign. It's all about the results IF you have a great product/service that is of genuine usefulness to your target market and you operate ethically, both with customers/clients AND your staff.
3. Empowerment: I get a huge kick out of helping others - time permitting - to succeed which is what all of my various products and services over the years have attempted to do.
And I just don't see the ROI in typical Internet Marketing when there is a MASSIVE alternative to go after: the non-IM online business world which makes IM look like a microscopic speck-sized cottage industry in comparison.
If you don't believe me, read this story:
http://www.smh.com.au/technology/technology-news/the-boys-who-built-a-1b-company-in-the-cloud-20120627-212d1.html
I didn't see these guys trying to sell a $1/$7 WSO about Facebook ads.
Now I am not dissing IM as I view it as a fantastic training ground or stage for online business but there comes a time when we should graduate to real business.
For instance, though I am biased of course, I regard Traffic Planet as the postgraduate 'next stage' for IMers/SEOers after Warrior Forum (can't believe how bad some of the SEO advice is there at times!).
In the same way, I URGE you (if you aren't already and this matches your ambitions/objectives) to target the REAL online business (like the Atlassian dudes) world rather than the IM world discussed above.
However, I am not suggesting that the online business world is amazing in terms of innovation, creativity or 'best practice'. In fact, it is usually so bad at these that guys like us from the IM/SEO world are 500 miles ahead of them in term of innovation.
Personally, I've lost count of the number of times I've showed a business owner the Google Keyword Tool and they thought it was the most astonishing thing they'd ever seen!
So let's recap on a few important strengths and weaknesses of the 2 aforementioned worlds of online business:
Typical Internet Marketing
- Arms race of hype in pitches (can it get any higher?)
- Arms race in offering lower and lower prices e.g. single digit dollar amounts, margins often slashed by affiliate commissions
- Zero credibility with non-IM business
- Businesses are usually not a resellable business asset (there are exceptions of course)
- Target market relatively small
- Very competitive space
- Usually online marketers making a living by teaching other online marketers how to get better at some aspect of online marketing (sometimes with software tools)
- Tends to target IM newbies desperate for extra income
- Staff uniform: Pyjamas/underwear
- Customer support: poor to excellent
- Willingness to pay high/er prices for proven solutions: not great
Typical Online Non-IM Business
- Very big target markets (proof coming for that)
- Bland corporate style
- Slow to move but major resources when they do act
- Higher pricing points than IM
- Don't target newbies with 'get rich quick' type promises
- Often service-based (e.g. Visual Website Optimizer, ManageWP.com) rather than infoproduct based (e.g. Mass Control, Commission Blueprint)
- Usually run like a real business with real staff (who don't spend all day in their pyjamas or underwear), real phone numbers, a real office, taxes paid etc
- Customer support: ironically, it's usually terrble
- Awareness of software innovation (e.g. listbuilding), SEO or conversion tactics: usually hopeless (i.e. massive opportunities)
- Willingness to pay high/er prices for proven solutions: very good
Now at this point, you could be thinking 'OK tough guy, you want me to focus on a real business to the non-IM world, how do I do that?'
Well, here is an excellent starting point from Noah Kagan who DOES have a series of very successful startups behind him (not just another business theorist whose never had a real business) - in my view, this article is one of the best I've ever read on this topic:
http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2011/09/24/how-to-create-a-million-dollar-business-this-weekend-examples-appsumo-mint-chihuahuas/
When Noah Kagan set up Appsumo.com, which now has 600,000+ list (he hugely AVOIDED the IM niche as did Brian Clarke with Copyblogger.com - supposedly a $5m+ a year business) he went to places like LinkedIn to find users/customers in the non-IM business community.
If we regard the Warrior Forum as the heavyweight in IM, they claim to have 538,963 members.
Sounds impressive but ACTIVE members are:
"Currently Active Users: 12556 (3054 members and 9502 guests) (snapshot taken on August 26 2012)"
Now those are impressive numbers of course but compared to LinkedIn with its 100,000,000+ members?
And LinkedIn (like any forum such as WF) allows targeting by specific area of business with LinkedIn Groups:
And there are many other NON-IM online business hangouts to target your specific audience/s e.g. Ecademy UK (500,000 paying members - it's a multi multi million dollar a MONTH business).
Noah's best advice summarised from here:
http://www.appsumo.com/appsumo-growth-action-video/
is to figure out exactly WHO your prime target audience is and WHERE they hang out online.
You can also track the kind of money some startups are attracting here and they don't seem to be monkeying around with $7 WSOs either:
http://techcrunch.com/startups/
And it probably takes roughly the same amount of time to create a real business as it does a very good IM product that sells for $7/$17/$27 (read this on how long it took/takes Noah Kagan to pull a startup business together).
Crudely simplified and generalised, we IMers have the SKILLS but lack the AMBITION and the non-IM online business world often has the AMBITION without the SKILLS.
If that doesn't sound like an opportunity, I don't know what is.
Just as the IM community woke up to the lucrative nature of 'Offline Gold' in 2010 or thereabouts, we need to wake up to the MASSIVE potential for our own companies in the non-IM online business world.
On that topic, I LOVE this MUST-READ post by Clay Collins:
http://www.marketingshow.com/getting-to-game-over/
On a personal note, I have now moved everything to Bulgaria to set up a real company/ies focusing on bringing IM innovation to the non-IM online business world - I'll keep you updated on those projects and hopefully this post has fired you up to SUPERCHARGE your own IM business company.
Oh and you should also be DEVOURING this content too:
http://trafficplanet.com/forum/37-marketingexperimentscom-videos/
Keep me posted on your progress and don't forget to share your thoughts on this topic here:
http://trafficplanet.com/forum/32-online-startup-company-discussion/
All the best
TK