I told you about our upcoming UK Gold Event in November earlier this week and a TON of people got on the early notification list…..if you missed the  email or want to know more then here’s a quick video from Neil T and I.

http://www.UKGoldEvent.com/va

Taking on people

Neil, Karen and I are really looking forward to having our new person come on board full time at the end of the month for the positives and benefits he’ll bring to the business AND our members across the various businesses.

One thing I had forgotten is the paper work that goes with it, however, I know the person who’s joining us very well now and the advantages far outweigh the paper work!

More about that very soon.

Have a great weekend

Two people in the media have said things this week that really highlighted why one is a VERY successful entrepreneur and one is nothing short of a fool.

I was watching Dragons Den and Deborah Meaden said something that really struck home. During the program she was talking to a business owner who wanted investment in his business and said this… (Paraphrased)

"As a business owner it is YOU that is totally responsible for the success of your business, no one else. Failure or success is down to you, no excuses."

That says it all really, no matter what the economy, the business you are in or the customer/clients who buy from you your success ultimately relies on you.

I agree.

Now, if you want to see a prime example of someone who couldn’t run their own business, never mind the economy of the country you only had to listen to Alistair Darling’s comments about the UK economy last week. In one sweeping statement he gave everyone who needed a one an excuse to blame anything but themselves.

I am not debating political allegiance here, or policy, I am lambasting his comments that did more potential damage to how the UK business and public view this so called credit crunch.

To quote…."It is not the job of a Chancellor to talk down the economy - be realistic by all means, but being gratuitously alarmist is unforgivable"

The media over the recent months have done more than fair share of negative reporting about this economy that it didn’t need a politician, who should know better, to spout off and drive in the imaginary knife further.

Give me Deborah Meaden’s view anytime.

One set of people who have grabbed the bull (and economy) by the horns and made a success of their businesses are the Gold & Gold+ Members of the Internet Marketing Review who will be speaking at this years UK GOLD Event in November.

This is your chance to come and listen to, meet with and ask questions of people who are JUST LIKE YOU, running information marketing businesses in niche markets and doing very well thank you.

http://www.UKGoldEvent.com

Last year’s event was a great success and the overwhelming opinion was to run another one this year.

This year we have people in different markets from leisure to crafts and animals to assets!

The website will be live towards the end of this week as we are in negotiations to bring in a very special guest as a Keynote Speaker for the event. This is someone who has built, run and sold Internet Businesses worth millions, and is UK based.

You can sign up for the early bird notification list on the site now http://www.UKGoldEvent.com

We are already over 50% full due to past attendees ringing Karen to reserve their place BEFORE the website went live. We will be holding the event at our normal hotel and as such will be limiting the numbers. (Call Karen to reserve your place and claim the ‘August early bird discount’ in September today Tel. 01257 472120)

If you’ve been to one of our events then you know when we say limited numbers we mean it!

Visit http://www.UKGoldEvent.com today.

At the UK Gold Event this year Neil and I will also be presenting several new sessions on different parts of our business including our new ATAC(tm) traffic & profit system and our ‘Recession Proof Your Life’ project.

New Team Member

We will have a new full time team member join us on September 29th as our Web Content and Business Development Manager. You’ll ‘meet’ him online closer to the date however, if you’re in the UK then you may already know of him as he has been around the Internet world for a couple of years and has his own online presence.

Watch this space!

Don’t forget to always check who is influencing your thoughts whether it’s a politician, your friends & family or successful UK Entrepreneurs….YOU choose your input which will determine your output…positive or negative.

I know who I choose.

 

In Life, Aim High, Inspire and Smile

 

(See below for information on how you can spend a day with us and help create a new product.)

Well the weekend saw the start of the new premiership soccer season here in the UK and I decided to invest in another season ticket with Everton FC.

Now before you send me any remarks yes we had a dire start to the season but as with all Evertonians we are full of optimism although after the weekends performance I think 5th place looks a long way off!

We shall see as the season progresses.

One thing that does annoy me with Everton is their complete lack of sales management especially within the souvenir shop.

Every time I go in I come out shaking my head at the lack of sales management in the set up of the shop, the presentation of the products and the staff (Who seem more interested in talking to each other and avoiding helping customers!)

I compare that with the likes of Manchester Utd where the shop is a well oiled machine designed to ‘help’ you spend money on your team and feel good about it. (When I worked for the Bank we had a corporate box at UTD so I went quite a bit).

No matter what business you are in (on or offline) you must get your sales process right.

When was the last time you went through your sales process and even bought your product to see if everything flowed ok?

You’ll be surprised at what you may find…plus by walking though your sales process again you’ll come up with ideas to make it smoother AND opportunities for up sells & cross sells that you missed before.

Help Create A New Product

On September 6th 2008 (At the Haydock Thistle Hotel) we will be holding a one day workshop WITH A DIFFERENCE.

We are creating a brand new product on the creation and selling of ebooks and need YOUR HELP. And so we invite you to join us for a ONE OFF event at the fraction of the cost of our normal events where we will be revealing how we create and sell our ebooks and reports in various markets.

We’re looking for about a dozen people who will participate in the day as we show you how we have created and sold ebooks and reports that have been downloaded over 28,567 times over the last few years…

Everything will be covered from coming up with ideas, researching those ideas, getting your book created in 7 days or less, designing covers, creating a sales letter, right through to the most important aspect…the marketing and selling of your ebook.

Plus a special section on what can go wrong and how to fix it!

Normally we charge anywhere from £997 to £5000+ for our workshops however for this special day it will only be £247. The reason for this is that we will have the day filmed and will use part of the footage for the new product we will be creating.

Included in your £247 is the FULL workshop on the ebook publishing business, lunch & refreshments on the day AND your own personal copy of the DVDs so you can review the ebook workshop whenever you want. PLUS, we will also send you a copy of the full product once it is ready.

From you we’ll need your participation on the day to ask us questions and give us feedback on each section.

This is an exciting opportunity to join us for one day as we reveal the inner workings of part of our business and how we continue to bring in profits from simple ebooks that range in price from $19.97 up to £97 (yes pounds!).

To reserve your place on this very unique course and opportunity please call Karen on 01257 472120 to see if there are any places available….Remember we are only looking for about a dozen people to join us.

UPDATE: There are just 2 places left.

Give Karen a call to see if there’s a place available for you and I look forward to seeing you on the day. (Tel. 01257 472120)

 

In Life, Aim High, Inspire and Smile

 

It always amazes me how some people make this business appear so difficult.

Listen, Neil and I aren’t superhuman, we possess no special powers and we’re certainly no candidates for Mensa.

All we did was set out to create an Information Marketing Business in specific niche markets and enjoy what we do.

What could be harder?

A lot of things!

You see, as humans we tend to over think and over analyse things and seek answers to questions that aren’t there.

We are our own worst enemy.

Business is SIMPLE…find what your market wants and sell it to ‘em.

Neil and I have figured out what several markets want and successfully sell to them, however, not everything we do is a success. Failure is part of business and those people who don’t have failures are the ones who are doing nothing.

I wrote recently that people who want everything handed to them on a silver platter, for their specific situation AND have it done for them will be served up fools gold and not the diamonds they desire.

Whether you’re an information marketer, an engineer or provide a service your market has wants and desires and it’s up to you to find out what they are and sell it to them.

Simple…yes?

 

In Life, Aim High, Inspire and Smile

 

The end of another week and it looks as though the media hype of the so called credit crunch is starting to ease a little with more moderate (read non apocalyptic!) reporting.

We’ve even seen fuel prices come down at the local petrol stations (where was that reported?) and interest rates kept on hold.

Now is an ideal time to be marketing your business, products and services as those firms who belive the media withdraw into themselves and worry about the current economic climate.

The Tale of Two Businesses.

We use a couple of printers, and one more than the other. Our main printer has a great attitude and has the same outlook as us at this time.

Like us, he knows that the money in the economy at the beginning of this year hasn’t disappeared down a black hole…it’s still out there and people are still spending. However, they are spending it on what they want and with firms who are visible via the marketing they do.

Whenever I visit these printers I get a ‘positive’ vibe and enjoy speaking with the people there.

Compare that with the second printers we use on occasion.

I went there at the beginning of this week to discuss a job and I couldn’t belive the conversation I had.

The owner virtually talked me out getting the job done because the economy was slowing, people weren’t buying and I had to be careful with my marketing!

I felt like slapping the guy to get him out of this downward spiral!

Unfortunately no matter what I said he didn’t change his view. Here I was wanting to spend a significant sum with him and he was doing his best (or worst) to talk me out of it.

He’s sealed his own fate and I’ll be surprised if he’s in business at the end of the year if he continues this way.

Guess who got the business?

Yep…the first printers who I normally use anyway!

Your outlook, no matter what business you run, will determine your success.

I’m in London later today and tomorrow speaking at a B2B (business to business) emarketing convention and fully expect to field a number of questions about the economy.

No doubt I’ll have a couple of interesting conversations when people try and tell me it’s a hard time in business at the moment!

In today’s climate your offer and positioning to your customers and prospects is what will make you stand out either on or offline.

How do you stack up against your competitors whether your selling a $30 ebook, a £500 course, or a £1000 pound product to traditional businesses?

If you’re in a service business what makes you different?

Answer the questions above and your business will continue to grow, no matter what the economic climate.

Have a great weekend.

Best wishes

Neil

PS I’m out in London tomorrow evening with friends and apparently I’m being taken to a ‘beach’ party…in LONDON! ????

 

In Life…Aim High, Inspire and Smile.

 

The last few weeks have been hectic what with the office move and through great planning (Not!) we launched two promotions into two of our markets at the same time.

In defence to us if BT hadn’t messed up (several) times we would have been in the new offices earlier.

Anyway, we’re and I don’t find myself looking for things we’ve left back at the house so it’s looking good so far

We’re now working on the new benefits we can bring to the Internet Marketing Review Gold and Gold+ Members and will be unavailing them very soon.

If you’re not yet a member (and why not? ) you can take us for a test drive for two months for fr-ee…more details here:

Internet Marketing Review Two Month Free trial

Out of the members we have and the limited people we work with the most successful ones are those who operate in a niche market creating products and services to sell to that market over and over.

In fact our own business grew exponentially when we focused on just a handful of core markets.

Can you still be successful with a portfolio of sites?

I think you can…we still have numerous ebook/audio sites that continue to sell…however, we now recommend you focus your energy on one or two markets that you can really get to know, discover what they want and position yourself as the ‘expert’ or ‘authority’ in that market.

Just my thoughts

Mastermind

Last week I switched on the TV after a LONG day carrying boxes and setting up the office and Mastermind was on.

Now, not usually a TV programme that I’d watch but what fascinated me was the topics of the specialist subjects.

Here’s the four from the programme I watched:

• Desert Orchid (The Race Horse)
• Heavy Weight Boxers 1945 to 1970
• History of The Superbowl
• FA Cup Finals Since 1970

As you can see a wide variety of topics and interests!

I am constantly amazed at what interests people have and the amount of money they will spend on them.

If you took the time to look into these topics online you’ll see that there’s a lot of sites, information and products….AND one of the above is a very interesting market for the right person to enter as an information marketer

The Run In

We’re now entering what I call the run in which is the time from now until December and is traditionally a busy (and profitable) time for Direct Marketers…that includes us Information Marketers.

Don’t let these months pass you by, make your marketing plans now if you haven’t already done so and I look forward to hearing of your success.

Best wishes

Neil S.

In Life…Aim High, Inspire and Smile!

 

Neil Travers here from the Internet Marketing Review and I wanted to bring you an update to something we’ve been working on for you.

It only applies to the UK so I apologise to our friends from foreign shores.

A few weeks ago, at one of our football training sessions… my mobile phone started ringing, now normally I’d ignore it if I’m training the players, but since we were only having a light session after winning the league title and the caller ID came up as "Staffs Mobile" aka Neil Stafford, I thought I’d take it.

The content of the call was important because I knew, Neil was lining up some of the speakers for our UK Gold Event II in November and so if he was disrupting my session then he must’ve been pretty excited and needed to tell me the big news.

Sure enough it was big news and we’ll be sharing it with you very shortly.

Standing close by when I was taking the call was Patrick Gill. Patrick is the father of one of our best goal scorers and is the owner of, PRS Telecoms.

He said he’d been meaning to talk to me about our company mobiles since he knows that I’m almost permanently on mine! Patrick told me something that I couldn’t believe… he told me that nearly half of the mobile phone users in this country are on either the wrong tariff or they’re using the wrong phone.

15 million users are on the Wrong Tariff or using the Wrong Phone… are you one of them?

When Patrick asked me what phone I was using and what tariff I was one, I have to say that I was one of the 15 million who didn’t have a clue.

Now I hadn’t really thought about my mobile telephone usage until I had this chat with Patrick. You see, this is where superior knowledge comes into play and also knowing the right people!

So I asked Patrick what are the five biggest mistakes that people make when choosing a mobile phone, this is what you need to know or check…

1. What’s included in the tariff

2. What’s not included in the tariff

3. How much you really do use the phone, don’t guess

4. When the contract will finish… not when an upgrade is available

5. What you will be using your phone for.

While these five statements might sound like common sense they aren’t common practice. In fact, Patrick told me he often saves clients hundreds of pounds each year by getting them on the right contracts… and organises new handsets too!

If you’re anything like our family, Tracy, Jack and Harry have all got independent contracts and then there’s mine too. Because they were all taken out separately we haven’t got the best all round deal for us collectively. And I pay VAT on them too ! There are 6 million phones on consumer contracts that should be on business tariffs - which are cheaper - and that’s before you claim the VAT back!

Bringing Our Network Of Expertise To You

Now, time to tap into Patrick’s knowledge!

I asked Patrick if could we use his knowledge for our Internet Marketing Review Tip of the Week subscribers and he agreed to set up a dedicated line that will be exclusively for you.

If you would like to take Patrick or his team up on his offer to review your mobile tariff and phone and challenge him to get you a better deal that suits your circumstances rather than being one of the 15 million walking around on the wrong tariff with the wrong handset, then all you need to do is call the number below:

Tel. 0844 811 2816

Knowing how important mobile phones are today, staying in touch with family and friends as well as keeping an eye on your business too, by using a Blackberry or having email delivered to your mobile, I’m sure Patrick and his team will be able to assist you in getting the right tariff and the right handset at the right price.

Call Patrick now on 0844 811 2816

Best wishes

Neil Travers

PS…

As well as Blackberry phones, Patrick also has access to every other handset under the sun! So you should never be more than a click away from seeing new orders hitting your inbox through your mobile handset!

Give him and his team a call today and see what you can save. Telephone: 0844 811 2816

 

 

Back in January I wrote about Twitter on the Internet Marketing Review Discussion Forum and what you should be looking at BEFORE you dive into any new media…

Read about it here:

Internet Marketing Review Discussion About Twitter

The reason bring it up again is that over the last couple of weeks I’ve read more and more people proclaiming that Twitter is the next big thing in marketing.

Is that the same big thing as MySpace and then Facebook or Squidoo or….well you get the idea.

Before you rush off and spend valuable hours working out any new media take a step back and have a look exactly where it fits into your business or are there other areas where you can spend your time for a better return?
Back to Twitter.

This is a great platform for people who want to keep in touch while on the move and especially when travelling as you can text from your mobile the updates you want going on your page.

Think of Twitter as a micro blog and to that end, if you’re not travelling then why not just update your blog? 

When you read the next so called Guru’s email update demanding that you MUST get onto Twitter or your business will fade away…THINK!

Let me give you an example where it doesn’t make sense (at this time) to run a Twitter account.

We’ve recently run a survey in our soccer coaching market two of the questions asked…

1. Have you heard of the online service called Twitter?
2. If Yes, have you used it?

Without giving too much away about our market I will tell you that we have over a thousand responses to our survey and to those two questions less than 1% had heard of Twitter and of that sample not one was using it.

So, it does not make sense to use Twitter in that market.

Mixing It Up

With marketing your business I urge you to use different media (including offline) and multiple touch points with your customers and prospects with the Caveat…..Make sure you are actually reaching those people with media they are using themselves.

I’ve opened a Twitter account (it’s free to do so) and if you REALLY want to ‘follow me’ on Twitter you can do so here:

Follow Neil Stafford on Twitter

WARNING

Updates will be sporadic and may even be sarcastic from time to time…

In fact I’ll go as far to say that like all the other ‘Big Things & Must haves’ Twitter will drop from the headlines and quietly carry on as it was intended while the hype pushers focus on the next shiny new object to promote.

Finally…

Here’s a very funny video that I think sums up Twitter…..enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ALbH63Ali9U

 

"In Life…Aim High Inspire and Smile"

 

It’s been a while since my last email update as we’ve been on what can be called a tour of the USA…starting out near Phoenix Arizona and ending in Baltimore on the East coast.

Karen and I spent 4 days in Arizona at the offices of our database software providers Infusion for intensive training and updates on the custom programming they have done for us. Plus we had insights into a number of business and BRAND NEW technology.

From here we flew over to Baltimore to meet up with Neil T. All three of us spent a day in downtown Baltimore around the harbour area before Karen flew back leaving Neil and I to attend a three day session with our Mastermind Group.

You can read more about it in the up coming issue of the Internet Marketing Review along with what we learned and are implementing as a direct result of that trip.

We’re back now refreshed and charged ready for the second half of 2008.

Are you?

Half the year over with and have you reviewed where you are to date against your year plan, quarterly plan and month plan?

Still don’t have a plan?…Then get one now and don’t let the second half of this fantastic year pass you buy.

I received an email while in the US asking why I don’t talk about the economy and its current state.

If you’ve read my updates for a while now you’ll know that I believe this economy is a direct result of the media talking us into it and a small number of powerful ‘players’ in the worlds financial markets betting against oil prices.

Oil is not in short supply, so why the prices increase…..look beyond the media hype and examine the financial markets and the current US$ rate (it was great for us while over there and our Mastermind Group has enabled us to invest in companies and property in the US at highly discounted rates).

There is no such thing as a bad economy for everyone, nor a good economy for everyone…just the current economy.

YOU decide how you want to ride the current economic wave.

April, May and June (to date) have been the best three months in our business to date; we operate on a world stage and sell products that people want, in a way that is attractive to them and at prices WE dictate.

How do you approach your market?

We REFUSE to play in the price comparison market, we do not sell as a commodity and neither should you.

If you’re moaning about your market then take a look inward as you have attracted those people.

The solution…change the ‘bait’ you’re fishing with and attract the clients and customers YOU want to deal with at the prices you set.

One thing the media reporting of this economy will do is separate the poor and average business from the truly exception ones.

You’ll find the top tier in business charging more, providing better services at higher prices while the average businesses will either go out of business or become part of the economy that fights it out at the bottom on price alone with the rest of the bottom feeders.

Take a look at your business and see where you can add value, increase the perceived service and offers you make and therefore increase your profit potential.

In the next edition of the Newsletter I discuss how our recent mastermind group helped us reshape a business where the current average transaction equates to £99 up to an average of £750 while reducing the number of clients we’ll deal with.

There’s another 6 months left of 2008 and we’ll soon be entering what is traditionally considered the best direct selling months of the year…..get your plans in place to ride the wave until the end of the year.

We have…will you?

Take a look at this page from one of the suppliers we use…these guys have got it BIG TIME…not only have they created an interactive promotion with their customers, they are soliciting ACTIVE Feedback AND it is a very engaging style.

http://www.bigpockets.co.uk/product.php?lang=&product=BOXSPEC001

This what we teach you to be innovative in your promotions to stand out from your competition.

I was debating whether to show this to you or actually ‘Swipe and Deploy’ into the IMR  

Take a look at a couple of the videos sent in by their customers. (Especially the first one!)

Do you think this page will be passed around by web users…yes (hey I’m doing it)

Brilliant stuff.

Neil

In Life Aim High, Inspire and Smile