Really don’t have anything valuable to say about this. Just find it interesting that even Facebook, who probably has millions of sign ups a day, still split tests. They added the “(and always will be)” and switched up how the input field form looks to make it bigger. Kinda interesting.
I’ve hinted a few times on this blog about how I was taken to the cleaners legally by a massive company (can’t give any details) a few years ago, so I’m always looking for legal advice and trying to educate myself on how to make myself less vulnerable to being bent over by another high powered law firm again. So I was excited when I saw that Shoemoney was going to make a video called “Kicking Legal’s Ass”.
This is the latest video in Shoemoney’s newest training series and he talks about how he and his legal team burn people to the ground for using his copyrighted and registered images and materials. It’s funny how a friendly “leave our shit alone” cease and desist letter that could be taken care of by simply removing the offending content, ad or whatever, turns into potentially a $500k – $1Mil settlement just because the douche bags stealing his content think that he’s bluffing.
Watch the video. If you’re in the make money online scene, or do any business online, you’ll appreciate it. PLUS the Shoe gives like 13 COMPLETELY FREE example legal letters & documents including: legal affidavit, disclaimer & terms of service, privacy policy, and tons more. I’m ALWAYS looking for stuff like this so I really appreciate Shoe being this candid about all of this legal crap. Obviously, if you’re going to use his example letters, have a lawyer look over them to make sure they work for your particular business.
Lessons Learned
Lessons I Learned From My Legal Battle
I’ve thought that Shoe was a bad ass ever since I started doing affiliate marketing in early 2008. If you know him at all, you know that he’s always got some new product, or project brewing and if you’re subscribed to his email list you will hear all about what he’s up to. Turns out he’s been working on a sales video training series because he’s noticed that most affiliates suck at actual real world sales tactics.
Anywho, I got the “early bird” email about the new shoemoney 2.0 system weapons of marketing blueprint video series and blew it off for a couple of days because I’m above being marketed to. 
Just reopened the email after having seen a few people talk about it online, and I’m glad I did.
I hate feeling like I’m marketing to you readers on here, so don’t feel like you have to go sign up just because I say so, but all you have to do is put in your email address and then you can watch the weapons of marketing blueprint video that shoemoney put together. The tactics are real simple and elementary, but tons of people don’t really know and understand how to apply them to affiliate marketing online. Anyways, I’m watching the video for a second time right now because I had some killer ideas that I forgot to write down the first time I was watching it.
Some of the tactics include:
If you already know, or think you know all of these sales tactics, then go watch this video just to hear shoe (a self-made multimillionaire) talk about them if for no other reason. The guy is the ultimate marketer. He’s so up front, honest, trustworthy and smoothe, but at the same time, you know he’s setting you up for a sale even while he’s teaching you about how to sell to people. lol. Awesome marketer.
…and food is not one of them, regardless of whether I think it should or not.
We as internet marketers hear it all the time. Hustle this, hustle that. “#hustle” and on and on. What exactly do people mean when they say they are “hustling” anyways?
I’m convinced that 50% of them are posing because it makes them look like a baller on their Twitter feed, or Facebook walls. Another 40% are facebooking, tweeting, emailing, and doing a myriad of other distracting activities that make them think they are hustling just because they are keeping busy. And then there is the elite 10% that IS actually #hustle – ing. Ferrr Realziez.
Faith Without Works is Dead. Hustle Without Definition is Bullshit. – Jeremy Blake
So what exactly does it mean to hustle, and more importantly, what are 5 things that you should be hustling for as an internet marketer?
Link building is just one of those things that never ceases to be important. Regardless of what Shoestradamus tends to think about the future of SEO, I think that for at least 5 more years link building will be important. Especially in the social bookmarking realm, which I have started taking very much advantage of in various niches. So keep link building. It’s easy to buy into the idea that SEO is dead, or dying, but hey, it’s stillll workin for me.
The Takeaway: Link build as much as possible! Without looking like a robot, of course. And try to add some degree of value (Read: relevant link building). Spam is crap.
Idea Brainstorming is always something that I love to do. Funny thing is, it’s involuntary. I wish there were just some switch to turn it on or off, but it depends a lot on the mood I’m in, what music I’m listening to, how hungry I am, what book I may have just finished reading, and a variety of other factors. Most awesome ideas come when I have some peaceful, inspirational music on and I’m at relative peace with myself and the world. Then the ideas start to flow… You need to find out what sparks this revelatory process for you. Then get in those moods, listen to that music, read those books and do whatever it takes to get inspiration, and then always be ready to write those ideas down. Tell ya what, amazing things happen when you start actually writing down and cataloging your ideas.
The Takeaway: Learn what moods, music, and books spur inspiration in yourself and put yourself in these situations as often as possible.
Relationship Building is something that I suck at. I’m far better at building relationships in the digital world than I am in the real world. I dunno, it’s probably because I’m a pansy and usually lacking confidence and it’s a lot easier to type out an email, read it over 400 times, and then send it and wait for a reply then to tell someone how I feel face to face. I may be a pansy, but there are several reasons why I think email is 400x more efficient than face-to-face communication, but…(I’ll get into defending myself on this front in a later post).
Anywho, some of my best relationships as far as business goes, have been built online, and they’re with people that I have never met face to face. Perhaps you reading this are one of those people. (Hey dude!) Point is, you need to get in the habit of linking up with people and building relationships be it in the digital realm, or for my brave warriors out there, in the physical, face-to-face realm. There are tons of people out there who are 100x smarter than you, and that are willing to help if you just ask. Just the same, maybe you’re good at something they suck at and they will feel like they can ask you something and you can help them out. This includes affiliate managers, fellow bloggers, people who comment on your blog, people who comment on other blogs that you comment on, etc… Relationship building 101 from a kid with no real friends. How about that?
The Takeaway: Even if you’re a pansy like me, there is endless opportunity to build meaningful, strong business relationships in the digital world.
Competition Sniping is an art that I have just learned to both enjoy and exploit. What do I mean? I mean pinpointing exactly what is making your #1 competitor successful and defining a pattern of hustle that will blow them out of the water. This could include reserving domain names that your competition may need (they just don’t realize it yet), reserving social media profiles with unique profile *cough*their*cough* names. Discovering their link building strategy, and linking yourself up where they’re linked up, and then working even harder to get tons more links than they have that are even MORE relevant than the links they have. These are just a few ideas. Just remember. We’re trying to dominate the marathon, not the sprint. Chances are, your competition is riding the sugar high of winning the sprint and is blinded by the success they are feeling now to open their eyes to expansion opportunities and growth potential. Kick their ass.
The Takeaway: Treat your competition like bullies used to treat me in school. There is so much that your competition is NOT doing, or doing properly. Stop focusing on what they are doing well, and start focusing on what they aren’t, and how you can sneak in and insert a treadmill under their feet. Get it? So they think they’re still sprinting, but they really aren’t going anywhere. I’m so cool.
Outsourcing is one of the best things that I have ever discovered. This is the part where we define a hustle, and then tell someone else to do it. If you haven’t fully grasped the power of not having to work as hard as you used to yet, you need to get on it. I know several people in my family that would be disgusted to read what I just wrote. They’d think, how could that little sob mf&*@# possibly work any less than he already does? Well, my friends, I outsource. I tell someone to do something, they do it, I do my thing (which takes much less effort and time), and then I get paid. And the pay is swell. And the effort is minimal.
The Takeaway: Stop working so damned hard. Pay someone to write those articles. Hire someone to design that logo for you. You suck at it, and I doubt you’re planning on taking graphic design classes any time soon, so stop hating on yourself and your lack of skill and pay someone to do it. Heck, there are tons of people on a cool site called Fiverr (my post about it) that are willing to make one for you for only $5 bucks. (something funny I did with Fiverr NSFW)
So in summary, you should probably stop saying that you’re hustling just to say it. Define that hustle, and start actually hustling. There’s no hustle in screwing around on Facebook, Twitter, and other social media accounts all day (unless you’ve defined that into your hustle plan, of course). Let your ocean-side mansion, butler, and Lamborghini all speak for your hustle some day.
Sorry Emily, but you’re gonna have to move aside. I regret to inform you that you have just been replaced by this chick. And no, it’s not a Photoshop job.
Buy services, sell services for $5 at Fiverr.
Coolest idea I’ve seen in a long time. So far I’ve paid $5 for 10 minutes of business consulting from a guy who’s started 3 companies that made it into INC 500, and I’m getting ready to pay for some super cheap SEO stuff…assuming it doesn’t smell too black hat /ass hat, of course. I’ll probably end up doing the business consulting thing tomorrow, so I’ll let you know how it goes. It’s via instant messaging which is a good thing. If it were over the phone, the dude couldn’t have paid ME $500 bones to talk for 10 minutes. It’s called: I hate talking on the phone because nothing productive ever happens.
I can see this turning out to be another sick, low-cost addiction, like buying stupid iPod apps here and there for $1-10 bucks a pop. Man, spending money is getting too easy nowadays. Oh well, at least I anticipate that I’ll gain some value from some of the services provided on here. Pretty sweet, huh?
Props to Zac Johnson for letting me know about Fiverr.
Update: Something funny I did with Fiverr. NSFW
Design, when I’m the designer, isn’t my favorite thing in the world and coming up with a color scheme ranks among my least favorite things to decide on when creating a new site. I used to browse those lame color wheel things and end up frustrated with bad combo’s and lacking understanding of how to apply the colors.
If you’re sort of in the same boat as me on this, I’d suggest you check out: http://www.colourlovers.com/. One of my favorite sections is the web trends page because it shows you the color schemes of a lot of different, and important web pages. It makes it easy to find a great color scheme, and since you can see how the scheme is used, you can just copy & tweak. I’ve used this for several of my new websites as well as for face lifting some of my old ones.
Completely free. Just thought I’d share another one of my tools.
It seems like every time one of my natural search sites starts doing really well, I get giddy and try to change things up. This usually results in decreased clutter, a more streamlined page, and me screwing things up in general. I’ll usually end up putting up just like one or two banners for the product that I am getting the most traffic for. Sometimes this works, but most of the time I lose.
Then I get real down on myself for a day or two while conversions suffer.
Then I remember something brilliant. It’s so simple it makes me angry. I need to put up more banners! I don’t care how clean I think the page looks. If it’s not making money, then it’s not doing its job. So, I take myself back to elementary school. I throw up tons of banners for, say, the top 10 products that I’m getting the most traffic for. Lo and behold: more conversions. More money.
Simple Tip: If you’re getting qualified traffic to your site, be it organic, or otherwise and your conversions aren’t really up to par, put up banners.
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