I am starting a new tradition for the day after Thanksgiving

November 25, 2011 by JD · 2 Comments
Filed under: Advertising, Holidays, Marketing, Musings 

Today, I am starting a new tradition.

And, I’ll be the first to admit that it’s a strange tradition for someone who loves selling and marketing.

While everyone else, apparently, goes into a month-long extravaganza of profligate spending, I choose to not buy and I will reduce my marketing so that I don’t add to the cacophony of advertising pitches that threaten to drown all of us this time of the year.

I am tired of the crass commercialism and greed of the so-called Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping hysteria. I choose not to participate.

For most of the last decade, I earned 100% of my income from affiliate marketing and plan to earn a major percentage in the coming years, but I have decided not to promote Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales.

Many of the merchants with whom I am affiliated sent me email this week announcing — breathlessly — their after Thanksgiving shopping sales.

I have chosen not to promote them. I will not promote them in the future. For the most part, I am declaring the few short days between Thanksgiving and Christmas to be commercial-free.

Instead, I intend to focus even more on being thankful for all the blessings I enjoy and for the wonderful people who are my family and friends.

(In fact, about the only things I’ll be promoting are the upcoming events at Sitesell over the next few weeks. Their timing just happens to be now; they are not tied to this season of advertising excess. Sometime in the next few days, Sitesell’s Facebook page will reach a milestone of 50,000 fans — or people who like them, if you prefer. There will be a celebration with prizes and I’m looking forward to this. I have predicted that they will reach 50K fans on December 2, 2011, a few minutes after 2:00pm (ET). The other thing I’ll enjoy is helping to beta test their new sitebuilding tool known as BB2, that should be introduced in mid-December. I’ll be discussing this on my 21st Century Affiliate Marketing blog.)

Years ago, I gave up giving Christmas gifts. I got tired of all the crass consumerism, commercialism, and greed, and decided not to participate.

It’s not because I’m cheap. I enjoy giving gifts, but not when it becomes something that is required. I would much rather give a gift because I see something that I know someone will enjoy and then give it to them for no special occasion. I give gifts because I want to, not because they are expected.

I have extended my personal gift-giving ban to include birthdays, too.

Today, I am carrying my little personal anti-consumerism boycott and protest another step forward.

Today, instead of rushing to the stores to buy more stuff, I will go through the castle and find everything that doesn’t fit and get rid of it.

I don’t remember much from last year, but I do remember deciding that everything had to have a place, or get tossed.

I have lived in a house with someone who reached a point where it was almost impossible to throw things away and I never want to live where stuff is piled up, ever again.

About the only things I’ve bought this year that don’t have a home are all these books. So, now, I have a pile of books in my to-be-read pile (12) and in my reading-them-now pile (5). I’ll be buying more.

(Ironically, they are all related to marketing, advertising, and selling.)

Before the sun sets, they will have a home in a cabinet, and whatever was there, will be gone. Everything else that doesn’t have a place of its own — and that does not include being piled on the couch or floor — will be gone, too.

I don’t have a name for my little protest and I don’t suggest that anyone else should agree with me. I am not trying to start a movement.

Do whatever floats your boat. It’s your choice.

If you want to buy all you can afford (and more) over the next few weeks, go for it.

It’s not for me.

Am I being hypocritical? I don’t know.

Am I being an old curmudgeon? Probably.

Am I tired of all the endless advertising hoopla? Definitely.

All the best,

JD

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Books – the best investment I ever made in myself and my future

November 11, 2011 by JD · Leave a Comment
Filed under: A Year From Now, Act On Your Dream, Advertising, Books, Marketing, Musings, Self-Improvement, Success and Failure 

If I keep buying books at the rate I have for the last month, I’m going to have to build a new wing on the castle to hold my library. Maybe I’ll give the library at the Biltmore House a run for it’s money. (grin)

When I was a computer consultant, I bought, studied, and re-read over 1,000 books and I don’t know how many magazines and white papers. That was before the Internet and it was the only way to keep up with all the changes and developments.

My wishlist for marketing, advertising, motivational, self-improvement, and “building a business” books is growing every day.

I’m mixing it up as I go. I’m trying to re-read a classic book, a theoretical book, and a practical book (and maybe more) all at the same time. (Well not exactly at the same time, but concurrently.)

I find it funny when people review books on Amazon and talk about a book being old, out of date, and no longer relevant. In most cases, I don’t see that, at all.

Sometimes I think someone gets only what they expect out of a book, and when your expectations are higher, some — not all — books reveal more to you, and the more you know, the more that is revealed.

I also believe that cynical, skeptical people never see the gold that is within their reach. It’s right there in front of their eyes, yet they don’t recognize it.

I’m currently re-reading a couple of great books, “The Success System That Never Fails,” by W. Clement Stone and “Scientific Advertising,” by Claude C. Hopkins. Both were written quite a while ago, and I find both of them to be informative, timely, and very useful. I’ve read both of them before, but it’s been over a decade since the last time.

I always keep a copy of Napoleon Hill’s Think and Grow Rich and his huge “Law of Success” books within arm’s reach. Both are bookmarked, dog-eared, underlined, highlighted, and full of my own scribbles. I refer to them all the time.

I recommend Napoleon Hill and W. Clement Stone’s Success through a Positive Mental Attitude. It has made a positive contribution to the lives of thousands of men and women, including me.

I have several ebooks that Ken Evoy wrote, or co-authored, on my desktop and I refer to them all the time. I read everything he writes and learn something almost every time.

I think some people want to find one book, with all the answers, that lays out a simple, easy-to-follow path to success that works for everyone.

To the best of my knowledge, having read a couple of thousand (or more) books, I don’t believe that book exists. I have found, though, that almost every book I read has a part of the puzzle and a few golden nuggets of brilliance.

As with finding real gold in mountains of dirt and rock, you have to do a lot of digging and following the shiny veins that lead to other veins of value.

A skeptic will never believe that it is possible to find the gold. A gullible person will mistake fool’s gold for the real thing. A prospector will find the most likely place to search for gold and then follow where the clues lead him.

I don’t know about you, but, over time, I tend to remember general concepts and forget details. I have to constantly refresh my thoughts and memories in order to stay on track and continue to be motivated at a high level.

Zig Ziglar once said, “People often say that motivation doesn’t last. Well, neither does bathing – that’s why we recommend it daily.”

So, I read motivational books, watch videos, listen to audio, and remind myself that my current situation is not a trap that will hold me forever. It’s up to me to decide where I want to go and how I’m going to get there — and who I’m going to help along the way.

One year ago, I felt horrible. For the last two years, I’ve barely been able to think. I couldn’t work. I could write, and I spent a lot of time on Facebook, writing when I felt like it. I had a couple of surgeries last year and about six months of chemotherapy, and there were days I could not get out of bed.

But, I intended to kick cancer’s butt, and it looks like we did it.

I still don’t remember a lot of what happened last year, but my memory is getting better. I read some of the things I wrote during the last two years and don’t remember writing them. It’s as if I’m reading something written by someone who sounds a lot like me, and it says I wrote it, and I agree with what it said, but I have no memory of doing it.

I’ve made a lot of progress in the last year. I’m alive, I’m getting healthier and stronger, and I’m able to remember what I learn and re-learn.

I’m still on disability and food stamps, but I intend to be off of both of them before I turn 60 on July 1, 2012. That is my number 1 major goal that I’m working towards.

To get there, I’m reading, learning, re-learning, and developing plans for my business and how I can help my clients and readers.

I’ve been evaluating myself and where I want to go. Will I achieve all my goals? I don’t know. I can’t tell the future. I’m sure there will be mis-steps and I’m sure I’ll turn down some wrong paths, but I’ll get back on track and do my best to reach each goal and then set out towards the next one.

Jim Rohn told of the time when he decided he didn’t want to lie to a girl scout, because he didn’t have enough cash to buy any cookies. That was when he started to invest in himself and to develop the skills and the attitude that led to his success.

I found a video where he tells that story:

Learn more from Jim Rohn: The Challenge to Succeed 4-CD Set by Jim Rohn

I listen to quite a few motivational people, some of whom earned fortunes “selling from the stage” by speaking at seminars and events and then motivating people to rush to the back of the room and buy their informational products that helped others lead better lives, as a result of what they learned and how they changed their attitudes and thinking.

People like Jim Rohn, Zig Ziglar, Dr. Maxwell Maltz and Dan Kennedy, and others spent untold hours developing the information they presented.

I come from a working class family. My grandfather on one side drove a trolley and worked in several factories. My grandfather on the other side was a tenant farmer.

My parents worked hard and provided for our family.

I remember one day when I was paving a road in Atlanta in the hot July sun and decided that there had to be more to my future and a better way to live.

That’s the day that I decided to do something about it.

I’d done well in high school, but learned that I did not like Ga. Tech, and quit after a couple of years. Then I worked hard for my living. I never seemed to get anywhere, until the day I decided to change my approach to living.

I was talking to a family friend a few weeks later and he introduced me to Napoleon Hill and gave me his copy of Think and Grow Rich.

It was only a few years later that I started my computer consulting business. Everyone told me it would be impossible. I didn’t have a college degree. I had no family connections. I had no money.

What I had was access to a public library. And, so, I started reading and learning, and planning.

(I think it is interesting that Andrew Carnegie charged Napoleon Hill to investigate the richest people of his time and then to report back on a system that would help others succeed. Mr. Hill spent about 20 years on that project and it resulted in the books I mentioned, and others. It was also Andrew Carnegie who donated the money to start the library where I went to learn how to accomplish what I wanted to do. At the time, that library was very valuable to me, because I had no money to buy the books I wanted to read and no friends who had them. So, I borrowed them from the library, and as I scraped up enough money to afford them, I bought them, and others.)

I was never motivated to earn a fortune, but I enjoyed earning enough to live life on my own terms. I’ve done that for the last 30+ years, mostly. There have been hills and valleys and bumps in the road. There have been obstacles to overcome. It was not a smooth path, but it was the path I chose, doing the things I felt were most important for me and my family.

Now, I’ve hit a new low. It’s the first time I’ve ever been dependent upon someone else to support me since I became an adult. I am happy that disability and food stamps got me past this disease that nearly killed me, but I don’t want to dwell upon it and I will stand on my own two feet and meet each of my goals.

If I have to read a thousand books, visit innumerable websites, learn from hundreds of experts, and invest thousands of dollars — that’s exactly what I’m going to do.

I intend to build a marketing system that works for my clients and I’m going to teach others how to do it, too.

You may be one of those people.

But, I’m not going to give it away.

If you’re a person who wants everything for free and you want it handed to you on a silver platter — you’re in the wrong place.

I intend to help people who are serious about business, and people who already own a brick and mortar business in the real world are the people I want to work with.

They don’t have the time to study and learn how to build a real marketing system, but I do. So, that’s what I’m working on.

In some ways, I’m following in the steps of Ziglar, Rohn, Kennedy, and others. I’m buying their books and studying them.

I subscribe to the Kennedy-Glazer Insider’s Circle and I’m working on reading all the books that Dan Kennedy and Bill Glazer have written.

And, I’m using the knowledge I’ve developed from decades of consulting and marketing my services as a foundation upon which I’ll build my business.

I have no plans to speak at seminars or sell from the stage, but I do intend to sell. I believe that selling is an honorable profession and I enjoy marketing and selling.

So, now I’ve found a way to get paid for doing something I love.

Once again, I’ve blurred the line between work and play and I am looking forward to the next few years with great anticipation.

I honestly don’t know how people can function in our quickly-changing, ever-more-technical world, if they aren’t constantly reading, learning, and re-learning, and adapting the successes of the past in order to find the successes of the future.

Technology has changed a lot. People have changed some, too, but not as much as some people think.

I like money in the bank. It doesn’t drive me the way it does some people, but I like having it available. It increases the options of what I can do.

But, more than money, I intend to be a better, more knowledgeable, more skillful, and more motivated person a year from now.

And even more so a year after that.

As soon as I post this to my blog, I have books and newsletters to study and a big mind map to update as I continue to develop my plans.

The best thing I ever did was to invest in myself. The written word, in books, newsletters, magazines, websites, white papers, reports, and other forms have been doorways to a better life. I am currently reading a half-dozen books and have 11 in the pile next to me that I’ve never read — yet. But, I will. That ought to keep me busy until January.

If you’ve waded through this and you’re still with me, I truly hope you find a way to earn a living from doing something you passionately enjoy. It’s one of the best feelings I’ve ever felt. Not the best, but close to it. (Being loved by someone that I love is a much better feeling, in case you’re wondering.)

At this point, I may be talking only to myself, but if you’re still here, thank you for reading.

Now, I’m going to proof-read this, make any necessary corrections, post it, and then turn my full attention to reading the current Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle newsletter. I can’t wait to see what golden nugget of knowledge I’ll find in it.

If you’re not happy with your life, the power to change it lies within yourself. I’m not promising that it will be easy, but I know it’s possible. I’ve seen too many other people do it.

I’ve done it, myself.

Act on your dream!

JD

PS. If you are an information junkie and are always buying “get rich quick” books and discs, but you never learn from them, stay away from the Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle.

Yes, I’m a member and an affiliate for this and it’s a real gold mine of information for people who are willing to take things slowly, to learn, to study, and then to IMPLEMENT what they learn. If you have the discernment and self-discipline to buy something, learn from it, and put it to work, you will learn a lot by becoming a member. If I had to, I’d give up eating for a few days to keep this subscription active.

If you are the type of spend-thrift who just buys and buys and buys, yet never learns and does, you can spend a lot of money here. These folks are master marketers and you can learn as much from how they market to you as you can from their books, tapes, seminars, and newsletters which explain how they market to you and show how you can do that to find new customers and prospects for your business.

And, yes, I get paid a commission for everything you buy through my link.

So, you would think that I’d want everyone who sees this to join and buy a bunch of stuff, but I don’t.

You read that right. That is NOT what I want.

I’ve seen too many people who waste the opportunities that they find. They buy, buy, buy, but never really commit to selling. They don’t develop the mindset, the systems, the promotions, the offers, and the products that help you build your own business. Somehow, they think that just buying the book or disc will magically impart the wisdom of the ages upon them.

It won’t. Never has. Never will.

So, I don’t want to lead these kinds of people into this marketing system.

Why, because I know you’ll buy. You may buy a lot.

But, when you do nothing with it, you’re going to be angry with me for recommending it and you’re going to be angry with Dan Kennedy and Bill Glazer for spending decades learning what works, and then spending more decades recording it in a number of forms and selling it. And, I assure you, they know how to sell, and sell, and sell.

I don’t want the negative vibes and bad energy that so many unhappy people can create. I don’t need that in my life.

So, if I just described you, please don’t buy anything I recommend, and I’d rather you quit reading what I write.

I want to give my best advice and recommendations to people who are open to making their lives better and who are willing to invest time, energy, creativity, and money into improving themselves and learning new skills, and then polishing those skills by implementing and improving what you have learned.

If you are one of those kinds of people, you have come to the right place.

If you’re not, please leave. Go play with the other people who daydream but don’t invest and build.

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Post flyers to your Facebook profile from Vflyer

March 12, 2009 by JD · Comments Off
Filed under: Advertising, Dilbeck Marketing, Internet Marketing, Murphy NC 28906, Web Services 

Do you know about Vflyer.com?

I’ve been watching this site as it has developed over the last couple of years and opened a free account in 2007, but never did much with it. I created a test flyer, but never published it.

I think Vflyer.com is ideally suited for people who sell products and who want to create flyers with text and photos using templates that are pretty well designed.

For example, if I were a real estate salesman or sold cars, I’d be using this service on a regular basis.

Since I sell services, I haven’t found it to be all that useful for me, but I keep in touch with what they’re doing so I can pass it along to my consulting clients.

Today, however, when I was catching up on reading the blogs to which I subscribe, I ran across a very interesting post on the Vflyer blog:

New Feature! Post Links to Your Flyers to Your Facebook Profile.

That caught my attention!

I’m always looking for ways to leverage my advertising on social networking sites.

Since I hadn’t visited my Vflyer site in awhile, I went there and saw how pathetic it really was. Now that I was aware of it, I couldn’t leave it like that, so I spent a half-hour or so updating the information and creating a new flyer for my local marketing consulting.

Just as their blog indicated, it was extremely easy to post a link to my new flyer on my Facebook profile.

Not only that, Vflyer automatically posted the flyer to my Google Base account and could have posted to other sites, but, since this was mainly for testing, I chose not to do that.

Another nice thing about Vflyer is that it is easy to create a PDF of your flyer that you can print, email, or otherwise distribute, even if you know practically nothing about PDFs.

There are a few things I don’t like about the flyer I created.

At the top of the flyer, where I’m describing my service, it does not put a blank line between paragraphs, or even indent new paragraphs, and I think that is just bad form.

Otherwise, I’m pretty happy with the layout and the ease of creation of the flyer.

I could have done it myself using Pages or a word processor, but it would have taken much longer and probably would not have looked as nice.

The other thing I am not happy with is the wording in the attributes section of the flyer. I know that it should talk to my clients and should not be about me, so there are some things I will be changing before I start distributing it seriously.

Still, it’s not bad for a free service and about a half-hour of work.

If you’re my friend on Facebook, you can see the link to the flyer.

I know I don’t use enough photos on my blogs and other publications, and this flyer is no different. If I had more talent in that area, I’m sure I could have found a good photo, but I didn’t.

However, if you’re renting property, selling homes, selling cars, or running a service business that is more appropriate for photos, Vflyer makes it easy to add them.

As a free user, you obviously don’t have all the features that paid members enjoy, but it still does a very good job. Paid accounts start at less than $15 per month and I believe their service would easily be worth that amount if I sold high-end products, especially if I lived in a larger town that had a local Craigslist or Kijiji site.

All in all, this was an unexpected, yet very interesting diversion from what I had planned for my morning.

I already know of a couple of clients I’ll be advising to start using the services provided by Vflyer.

What do you think?

Act on your dream!

JD

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Geographic-specific search results – hype or coming reality?

April 8, 2004 by JD · Comments Off
Filed under: Advertising, Internet, Small Business 

Will Local Search Live Up to its Hype?

The potential exists for more geographic-specific search results and advertising, but meeting Web users’ needs and getting local businesses to advertise remain challenges, say executives of search and online directory companies.

“About 98 percent of the 22 million businesses in the United States are small or midsized, and they spend about $22 billion a year in local advertising, Greg Sterling, a program director at The Kelsey Group, said in an opening address. While these businesses are familiar with buying traditional ads, such as print yellow-page listings or newspaper ads, many remain unfamiliar with search-based ads that involve an auction method for bidding on top keywords in search queries to return a sponsored link.”

[eWEEK Technology News]

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Google puts one more nail in the yellow pages coffin

March 31, 2004 by JD · Comments Off
Filed under: Advertising, Internet, Murphy North Carolina 

About a year ago, I started recommending, to anyone who would listen, that it was important to put full addresses, city, state, zip code and phone numbers with area codes on their websites.

Sharon Fling has been predicting the importance of promoting small local businesses on the Internet for a couple of years now, and those who have followed her advice are very well placed as we see more of the major search engines incorporate local searching in their arsenal of search tools.

Google now offers local search results — something they’ve been working on for months — and their implementation is coming along nicely.

For example, I just entered “restaurant 28906″ on their search page, and at the top of the results it shows a heading link for “Local results for restaurant near 28906″ followed by three local restaurants with their address and phone number.

If you click on the link just mentioned, it brings up a page of restaurants near Murphy, NC sorted by distance. It even lists the mileage and direction to the restaurant with a link for directions.

At the top of the page are other categories related to restaurants.

Right below that is a compass icon with a link to see the listings on a map of the region.

Clicking the link brings you to another page with a Mapquest map showing numbers indicating the restaurants. There is a legend to the right of the map showing the restaurant indicated by each number, with a link to the restaurant.

Mapquest maps for our mountain area are not extremely accurate and I often get erroneous results, but this map looks mostly accurate — although not 100%.

If I click on my favorite restaurant in Murphy, Shoebooties Cafe, next to its number in the legend, it brings you to a page dedicated to Shoebooties, with its location noted on the map and a button for getting driving directions.

I’m less satisfied with MapQuest’s driving directions, since they give you a 23 minute, 12 mile drive to get to a location that is about a 30 second walk from the main intersection in downtown Murphy. The last two or three steps in the directions are accurate, but I have no idea why they start where they do, way out west of Murphy a long way from the town.

Regardless of the deficiencies of the MapQuest directions, the Google implementation of local search is accurate and fast.

Let’s try another. How about “antiques 28906″ or “real estate 28906″?

For antiques, it lists three shops in the local section at the top of the page, but misses Pickled Parrot Antiques which is right in downtown Murphy and starts with a shop over two miles away. Pickled Parrot Antiques is listed first in the regular search results, right below the local results — so there are still some bugs to be worked out for the most accurate results.

For real estate, the link to the full page is more accurate than for antiques. It correctly lists the downtown real estate agencies and extends outwards from there. This is clearly useful.

While the Google local results feature is not as accurate as being listed in the yellow pages, it is free and fast. As time goes by, I’m assuming it can only get more accurate as Google improves their algorithm and cross-linking.

I think you’ll find this to be a very useful tool.

Looking for a bagpiper near you?

On a lark, I tried searching for “bagpiper 28906″ and learned that Clay Will lives about 40 miles southeast of me on the north shore of Lake Rabun in Georgia. I bet I never would have found him in the local yellow pages!

But, just when this looks great, I tried searching for “musician 28906″ and got results that were not very good. I know there are hundreds of excellent musicians within a 20 mile radius of here and none of them are listed.

“pizza murphy nc” correctly lists Downtown Pizza Co (where I had lunch a couple of days ago and enjoyed it) and branches out from there. It misses Papa’s Pizza To Go in Murphy, but finds the franchise in Blairsville, Georgia, which it says is about 15 miles south of Murphy, but I’m pretty sure it’s a good bit farther than that.

While still a work in progress, Google’s local search is decidedly useful, especially for businesses that are most likely to have a website or which may be listed in various directories.

I could probably spend the rest of the day playing with this, but it’s time to move on to other tasks!

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