Over my two decade journey in the online business world...
I've heard every excuse imaginable from aspiring entrepreneurs.
Most common is a lack of some resource.
Well, based on my personal experience, here are 11 resources or skills you don't need to have to grow a successful online business:
- You don't need to have connections. When I started I knew no one. And no one knew me.
- You don't need to have lots of start-up capital.
I started with $850 bucks, and never had to invest another dime of my own money after that.
- You don't need to be super-tech-savvy.
I only knew how to send email when I first started. And since it was before content management systems like WordPress and page-builders like Clickfunnels, I learned just enough about Microsoft FrontPage to set-up my marketing pages. And it worked fine.
- You don't need to be a great sales person.
I'm still not a great sales person. Nor do I enjoy one-on-one selling.
- You don't need to be an extrovert.
I'm a staunch introvert. I'm the guy at conferences who, after giving my keynote, spends most of my time in my hotel room. That's where I feel most comfortable.
- You don't have to be a great networker. I'm still not. See above for why.
- You don't have to be great on-camera. My early videos were terrible. And today you don't even have to be on-camera or be the face of your business if you don't want.
- You don't have to be highly-organized. Just ask my wife.
- You don't have to be an early-riser. I wake-up when I wake-up. Sometimes it's early, sometimes it's late. The only time I'm up at 4:30 AM is when I have to pee.
- You don't have to have a bunch of tools and software. You just need something to publish pages, process orders, and send email. That's it.
- You don't need to be a great copywriter. Of course, it can certainly help. But, I knew nothing about copywriting when I started. It was only over time that I got good. But I certainly wasn't good at the start.
The point is simple...
Tools don't make the entrepreneur.
It's not about resources; it's about being resourceful.
With that, let's get to this week's goodies...
😍 Enjoy the Memo? Share it with your friends, fans, or followers...
MY FAVS THIS WEEK
- 7 Questions Every CEO Should Ask Themselves Every 30 Days
I, too, am a big fan of Keith Cunningham's Thinking Time.
Not enough entrepreneurs take time out every week to ponder, think, and ask themselves questions.
Investing time to think about and answer any one of these seven questions can help you to see or understand things you may be missing right now. - An entrepreneur who interviewed 21 billionaires says the key difference between them and millionaires is how they answer a simple question about money
There's so much glitz, glamour, private planes, and Lambos in the "online marketing world."
This... is not that.
So it'll be contrarian to what you may see daily. But, necessary and worthwhile for you to hear. - One reason people don’t listen to you (and how to easily fix it)
Not everybody listens the same way. People process information differently.
Knowing which way your audience consumes information can be valuable. This little article can help.
🚨SWIPE OF THE WEEK
This week's Swipe File comes from one of the behemoths within the Agora Companies empire, Stansberry Research.
It's an oldie promotion... from almost 12 years ago... for a newsletter service which was called The 12% Letter.
While there are elements of this sales letter which would no longer be compliant today, the marketing idea, Unique Mechanism, and overall argument are still worthy of study.
In fact, the deck copy alone -- the pre-head, headline, and subheads -- are packed with marketing goodness you can and should learn from.
Recommended Resource
WHAT I'M TELLIN' MY TEAM
This week on our internal Team Marketing Training...
I walked the guys through 5 customer-acquisition principles absolutely critical today.
Let me share one with you.
It's much easier to engineer a successful marketing campaign by focusing on the creation of a stellar offer than it is on the creation of a stellar marketing message.
All... ALL... high-converting campaigns have at least one thing in common -- they present an offer which is wildly attractive to the marketplace.
Yet, as hard as it may be to believe, not all successful marketing campaigns have great copy. Many have average copy. But, what they do have is a great offer.
A great offer can make-up for a lot of marketing weaknesses.
But, great marketing, great copy, rarely makes-up for a weak, run-of-the-mill offer.
As well, engineering a stellar marketing message is a much harder skill to learn and develop than is engineering a stellar offer.
Anyone can learn to engineer wildly compelling offers. And fairly quickly.
Not anyone can become a great copywriter. There's a reason all-star copywriters are rare.
Fortunately, you don't need to be a great copywriter to engineer high-converting marketing campaigns.
But you absolutely need to learn how to create offers your marketplace finds superior, irresistible, and a no-brainer.
Team Takeaways In Three Bullets:
- The economic performance of a front-end marketing campaign is more important than the marketing performance. Meaning: Getting our costs and customer value where it needs to be is more critical than how well an individual page converts.
- Engineering an Attractive Solution is the first step when engineering an offer. It should come before we decide the price, terms, guarantee, etc.
- All campaign construction should start by engineering a stellar offer. Only after we've put together an offer which meets the minimum criteria should we begin developing the Big Marketing Idea.
🪰 "Be A Fly On The Wall As Todd Trains His Own Marketing Team Every Week"
See and hear everything Todd shares with this team -- every conversion tactic, copy hack, AOV booster, hook method, and more!
MY ADVICE
A question posted inside the E5 Nation Facebook Group...
Below is my response:
Raising your price can have an immediate positive impact on your Average Order Value (AOV).
It certainly will if you only have one offer in your marketing campaign.
However, raising your price can also have a negative impact on Cost Per Acquisition (CPA).
Why?
Because there's an inverse correlation between price and sales conversion rate.
Meaning: The higher the price point, typically the lower the sales conversion rate. Not always. But in most cases.
So, as you raise your price, you'll often see a decrease in sales conversion rate.
So, if you're raising your price on your core (only) offer, this means you'll likely acquire less new buyers.
Now... this may be a necessary step to take if your campaign economics aren't good enough for you to pay for advertising to drive new buyers.
However, if your thought is to increase the price of your core offer to increase your Average Order Value, here is what you should do first...
Put some AOV Boosters into your funnel, such as: a Bump Offer, Upsell, Downsell, etc.
Including these type of offers is a way of increasing your Average Order Value without impacting your sales conversion rate or volume of new buyers generated.
Meaning: Leave the price of your core offer the same... so you don't impact overall sales conversion rate and still generate the maximum new buyers; and, instead, include additional offers to raise the average transaction size.
Only after you include and optimize your AOV Boosters would I consider raising the price of your core offer if your campaign economics still aren't where they need to be.
***
NOTE: If you're not in the E5 Nation Facebook Group with us yet, you're missing out on the opportunity to have me answer your questions. Not too mention, some killer content and live streams only shared inside the Group.
Go here and join us inside the E5 Nation Group (it's FREE!).
ROCKSTAR RESOURCE
Curious about the trends of Facebook Advertising costs?
Like... what's the average Cost Per Click, Cost Per Lead, CPM?
Which Campaign Objective is most expensive, least expensive, trending up, trending down?
If any of those numbers interest you, check out this page.
PIC OF THE WEEK
This is Shannon Miller...
She was one of two guests we had speak with our TOP ONE Mastermind Members & Private Clients at our most recent experience.
Her story is so inspirational. And her approach to peak performance is extremely insightful.
If you don't know who Shannon is, here's a bit from her Wikipedia entry:
Shannon Lee Miller
was the 1993 and 1994 world all-around gymnastics champion, the 1996 Olympic balance beam champion, the 1995 Pan American Games all-around champion, and a member of the gold medal-winning Magnificent Seven team at the 1996 Olympics.
Along with Simone Biles, Miller is the most decorated U.S. female gymnast in Olympics history with a total of seven medals.
With a combined total of 16 World Championships and Olympic medals between 1991 and 1996, she is the second-most decorated American gymnast, male or female, behind Biles.
She was also the most successful American athlete at the 1992 Olympics, winning five medals.
WANT MORE HELP GROWING YOUR BUSINESS?
Here are some epic ways we can help you scale your business…
1. Fed up with your marketing being ignored?
Grab your copy of this book and over $1,100+ in bonuses.
2. Your offer not converting or AOV in the tank?
Grab this bundle that’s working insanely well for almost everyone who uses it.
3. Want our personal help in scaling your business from 6-figures to 7-figures and beyond?
