Many people have already heard the story of Kingsford Charcoal… For those who haven’t, it’s a little known fact that it actually started as Ford Charcoal. When Henry Ford built his automobile plants, he built saw mills to create the wooden parts that went in to his Model Ts. The saw dust and wood chips would begin to pile up. Henry quickly looked for a way to dispose of all of this scrap and, in doing so, learned all about the methods of compressing it and turning it in to charcoal. Henry Ford discovered a byproduct to his main product that turned in to a multi-million dollar business of its own. In the 70s an investment company purchased the charcoal portion of the business and renamed it Kingsford Charcoal.

The story of Kingsford charcoal may be an obvious example of a byproduct. They had factories and the excess wood chips just piled up. They had to stare at them everyday which eventually led to their idea. How do you spot byproducts, however, if you have no visible waste? What if you’re product is a digital product or even a blog?

Believe it or not, The WordPress Classroom began as a byproduct… I’ve been blogging since about 2006 with various other niche blogs. I learned how to monetize my blogs and make some extra cash back in 2007. I was going to build my online income through blogs alone because I had a few of them and I was good at it. Then one day, someone asked me, “Why aren’t you recording this process and teaching others how to blog?” That was a huge “Aha” moment for me. That was when I realized that I can be good at one thing and produce a byproduct by teaching others as I go along. The WordPress Classroom was born.

I don’t care what business you are in or which niche you chose to work in… Your business has byproducts. Have you ever seen DVDs of behind the scenes footage of musicians in the studio or musicians on tour? Those are byproducts of being in that industry. Have you ever gone to a live seminar and seen someone recording the seminar from the back of the room? They are creating a byproduct to sell later. Are you a dentist or a doctor or a mechanic? Is there any reason you can’t record your craft (with permission from your clients) and sell the videos as training material or use videos to overcome objections to people using your services? All of these ideas are potential byproducts of exactly what you’re doing right now. Even non-paid gigs can produce byproducts. Are you in to model planes, quilting, cooking, dirt bikes, or any other fun hobbies? Create a blog all about your hobby! It’s what you love doing, you’ll have no problem talking about it and engaging others. All byproducts.

My final example is what I’m doing right now… I’m in the process of creating a new site called LearnToBlog.com. During the entire process I’ve been turning on my screen capture software and explaining every last step that I’m taking to get this business online. I’ve recorded information about how I landed the domain, info about how I designed the logo, info about how I had the theme designed, info about having the theme coded, details about how I set up the affiliate program, how I protect the content, how I create the tutorial videos, and so on and so on… I’m thinking that, when all is said and done, I’ll be able to make just as much on the training of how I developed LearnToBlog as I did on selling subscriptions to the program itself. We’ll see.

The point is that there are byproducts that can be converted in to cash. It doesn’t matter what your business is or what your hobbies are. There are ways to squeeze some extra money out of what you do. Sometimes the byproducts just take a little hunting before they really become apparent.

Do you have any more examples of byproducts? Please leave some comments. I love the feedback!

Earlier today I decided to take a little stroll down memory lane… I started this blog in July of 2009 and I decided that it would kind of be cool to go back through and read my old posts. Sometimes I really take for granted how far I’ve come. Reading through my old posts literally brought tears to my eyes. Just remembering back to some of my early struggles and putting myself back in to places where I got so excited about things that I’d now probably consider fairly insignificant. Back then it was those small triumphs that kept me driving forward. It was those little wins here and there that kept the belief in my mind that I could be successful in business on my own.

I read one of my early posts where I described how excited I was to have 61 subscribers on a mailing list. Today I have over 20,000 subscribers and it probably grows between 50-100 subscribers every single day. I read a post about the day that I finally knew I was going to make it… I had made $300 over a three week period… In another post I talk about how The WordPress Classroom was such a huge success because I officially had 20 members. A couple of days ago the WordPress Classroom passed 1,200 members.

I hope you enjoy my blog and I hope that reading my posts has helped you in some way or another. What I never realized in the past is how much of a huge impact my blog posts would make on me in the future. Reading back through my blog and imagining the scale at which my business has grown over the past year and half has really hit me like a hammer. I’ve come a long way! I will never take for granted how I started. If I haven’t been keeping this blog over the past 18 months, I don’t even know if I would have really taken this step back to really reflect on my progress.

As a funny little side note, I found this image of what The WordPress Classroom looked like when I first opened it up. I’m actually curious to find out if there’s anyone reading my blog who was actually a member back when this is what the WordPress Classroom looked like… It’s definitely come a long way!

Those were my awesome Photoshop skills back before I learned that I should hire people to do that stuff for me. I always read that I needed to outsource but was always afraid to incur the expense. I know a lot of people are afraid of spending money to get their online business going before they’re actually making money but take my word for it… Learn to leverage other people’s skills and you will reach your goals so much faster than if you attempt to do it all yourself.

So what I want to do in this portion of my blog is look at the goals I set for 2010 and hold myself accountable. I’ll admit right now that I didn’t meet every single one of them but I did come damn close… So here it goes.

2010 Goals Recap and score card

Business Goals:

• Launch my new product (6 figures in sales) February Launch – I launched the Autopilot Cash Formula in April of 2010. I was a little behind schedule and the launch fell slightly short of hitting the six figure mark (but not by much).
• Build my list to over 20,000 subscribers – I originally set a goal of passing 10,000 subscribers but a few people told me that I wasn’t shooting high enough. I set my sights on 20,000 instead and managed to pass that number in October.
• Create at least one blog post per week - Failed miserably. I got so caught up in the other aspects of my business that I completely neglected my blog. Towards the end of the year I managed to start to pick up the pace again.
• Promote more product launches – I definitely promoted some great product launches. My philosophies changed a bit over the course of the year. It’s no longer a goal to promote a ton of product launches. It’s now my goal to get the products that I find will be the most beneficial to my followers in front of them. This mindset shift naturally means less promoting other people’s products.
• Rank #1 in at least one launch lead contest - I didn’t hit #1 on any leaderboards. I came in 7th when Josh launched Easy Video Player, 7th when Mike Filsaime launched AffiliateDotCom and 7th when Adeel Chowdry launched Hyper Facebook Traffic. (The later two I promoted with Josh Bartlett) I seem to be stuck at 7… But again, my mindset shifted away from promotions and I didn’t promote as many launches as I actually could have.
• Round up an army of affiliates to promote current and future products – I definitely did this. When I launched Autopilot Cash Formula in April, I had over 500 affiliates on board. I currently have around 300 affiliates actively promoting The WordPress Classroom.
• Launch a monthly membership site to build a recurring income - I switched the model of the WordPress Classroom from a one time fee to a monthly membership. This has been a huge success and everyone seems to agree that I still over-deliver for the price! I also partnered with Josh Bartlett to launch the Elite Marketing Foundation. This is another monthly membership site that is growing rapidly.
• Set up a coaching program with a partner – The Elite Marketing Foundation with Josh is the beginning phase of the coaching. We are working together to help as many people through mastermind calls and webinars as possible.
• Attend at least 4 internet marketing related seminars – Done and Done. I attended Affiliate Appreciation in Vegas in January, List Control in San Diego in May, the Info-Summit in Baltimore in November and AffiliateDotCom Live in Vegas in November. I made a ton of new contacts and have built some strong relationships. I also joined the local San Diego chapter of the Glazer-Kennedy Inner Circle which meets once per month.

Personal Goals

• Finish remodel of master bathroom - Finished this project January of 2010.
• Remodel guest bathroom - Finished this project January of 2010.
• Cut back on the sweets and the junk food - I basically created a whole new diet for myself that limits carbs and almost completely cuts out sugary foods. I’m still sticking with it. (Although I’ll admit I’ve fallen off the wagon a few times during periods of travel)
• Exercise at least 4 times per week - I managed to maintain a 5 day per week exercise schedule for a good part of the year. Once again, constant travel really interfered. (I was away from my home for a grand total of 10 weeks in 2010)
• Purchase a netbook - Bought a netbook, outgrew it, bought a MacBook and can’t live without it.
• Purchase a Jacuzzi – Still working on this one. Decided to spend money on travel and this was something I’ve sacrificed.
• Make enough income that wife is comfortable leaving her job - We’re still working on this one as well. Although my income has probably gotten to a point where she can safely quit, it’s still a scary leap. We just haven’t felt comfortable enough to take that next step.

Goals for 2011

Business Goals

• Triple my current monthly income
• Build my list past 100,000 subscribers (Shooting for the stars)
• Launch a new membership site (More broad than just WordPress)
• Develop and launch a piece of software that makes life easier
• Introduce direct mail marketing in to my business
• Create one new piece of content every day / 5 days per week (This will be hard!)
• Speak live at at least one live event
• Attend a minimum of 4 more marketing events
• Write a book on my journey so far

Personal Goals

• Stick with my low-carb / low-sugar diet
• 6 pack abs by June (Never had them in my life. This is the year)
• Leave the country at least twice
• Attend the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand in November
• Begin taking Improv Comedy classes in March
• Become a regular ToastMasters attendee (Starting tonight)
• Alana finally quits her job
• Buy a new house (Minimum 4 bedrooms)

As you can see, I’m setting my goals quite high. I’ve learned that when it comes to goal setting I need to set my goals for a notch past what I conceive myself capable of. I’d rather set a goal of a 100,000 mailing list and fail because I only hit 98,000 than set a goal of 30,000 and hit it and stop trying. I don’t think any of my goals are completely out of reach if I do everything that I know that I need to do. If I stick with the plan that I’m laying out for myself, every single item on my list should be a definitive success this time next year.

What are your 2011 goals? Is there any advice you’d give me in achieving my goals? I want to hear from you! Your feedback is what keeps me going.

Thanks so much and I can’t wait to hear what everyone else is striving to accomplish this year.

Don’t even get me started on Amazon’s wish list feature! Now I get to go through the whole gift registry process that I did for my wedding for every holiday. People never have to worry about getting the random gifts that they never wanted because they can now just tell everyone to check out their wish list! It’s pure genius.

Anyway… I’m sure there’s still some people out there who haven’t quite finished their Christmas shopping (like me) that are looking for some ideas. Obviously, I don’t have ideas for everyone but I can give you some cool ideas for the marketers and bloggers that you may know. (Or, in most scenarios, cool ideas to have “Santa” bring you.)

The Amazon Kindle
You can never stop learning. As a marketer and a blogger, I’m constantly reading and learning new techniques to up my game and to find inspiration for blog posts. I’ve built a massive collection of books over the years. Now I’m starting to get all of my books on Kindle instead. It makes it so easy to travel with tons of books without loading up my carry-on. Many people think that the iPad is better but I have to disagree. The iPad is cool but the Kindle does one thing and it does it better than anything else. On an iPad, you are basically looking at another computer monitor… This causes eye strain. The Kindle looks like actual ink on paper and never gets tiring on the eyes. iPads have a glossy screen, which causes reflection issues when trying to read in bright daylight. The Kindle has a matte screen and is readable on the brightest of days. However, the biggest thing that the Kindle has over the iPad is battery life. You iPad will get maybe 10 hours at its very best (but don’t count on it). The Kindle will go 30 days without needing a recharge! This makes it the perfect travel, reading companion. Once you have one, you’ll never understand how you lived without it.

Kodak Zi8 Pocket Video Camera
This is the best pocket video camera on the market. If you want to always have a camera with you so that you can shoot quick videos on the fly, this is what you need. This little guy will shoot videos in full 1080p HD and it will also shoot at 60 frames per second. It has descent image stabilization and, best of all, it’s got a microphone input. I use my Zi8 on a daily basis and get compliments on the quality constantly. As of writing this, Amazon has these for under $100 (an absolute steal). Grab an extra memory card while your at it because one of the many benefits of the Zi8 over the Flip cameras is the ability to swap out memory cards, giving you practically unlimited storage capability if you carry a couple back-up cards.

Dragon Naturally Speaking
Have you ever wanted to create a blog post or write an article, sat down at your computer, and just couldn’t get your fingers moving to start typing? Sometimes you know how you want to say something but you just can’t seem to get out on the screen. Dragon Naturally Speaking allows you to speak while the software transcribes everything you say on to the screen. It works amazingly well too. The software learns your voice and how you say certain words over time and gets better and better at transcribing every time you use it. When I was in college, this software was a life-saver. It made the daunting task of writing essays seem fairly effortless. Now I use it to write blog posts and articles all the time. The cool thing is that it makes your posts sound very natural because they’re written how you talk and not how you type. Usually you’ll need to go back and do a little bit of editing and tweaking to get it just right but it sure works well and it really feels like you’re saving a lot of time. **Quick Tip** You can have Dragon Naturally Speaking running in the background of your computer while you’re making a screen capture video or while your doing a webcam video. The software will transcribe the audio in real time and you’ll have a bonus text version to compliment your video. **Quick Tip**

Presto Electronic Clock/Timer
I haven’t written my post on time management yet but, when I do, you’ll notice that this little gadget plays a big part of it. This is the exact timer that I have sitting on my desk right now. It’s got a clock, a stopwatch, and a countdown timer. It’s very basic but it does exactly what I need it to do. I find that when I’m working on a project, I do best when I’m constrained to deadlines. I use this little timer to self-impose deadlines on everything I do. This blog post, for example, I gave myself one hour to complete it. I’ve got my countdown timer going and when time runs out, I’m hitting the publish button. When you’re under that kind of pressure, you tend to get things done. I know that I’m going to hit publish, whether this article is done or not. I damn well better get it finished otherwise I’m going to get crap from people for having an incomplete blog post. Any business person who wants to accomplish anything needs to set time constraints on any project they begin. This is one of the key ideas behind proper time management.

Gunnar Optiks Digital Performance Eyewear
These things will save your eyes. The Gunnar Optiks Computer Glasses are designed for people who stare at a computer for long periods of time. This is actually a product that is still on my own wish list. I don’t own a pair yet but I have a friend who does and he absolutely swears by them. For someone who stares at a computer screen for 8+ hours per day, something like this seems like an absolute necessity. All the reviews say that these are comfortable and the price has really come down on these things since I first started looking in to them a few months ago. Unfortunately, I’m not allowed to buy a pair yet because they’re on my Amazon wish list and I’ve been forbidden to purchase anything until after Christmas. So… fingers crossed.

Recommended Books

Here’s a list of my current favorite books that would make excellent Christmas presents:
No B.S. Time Management for Entrepreneurs is probably the best book on time management that I’ve ever read. It’s got great advice in it and I am an absolute raving fan of Dan Kennedy and pretty much every book he’s written. This book exemplifies his work and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend any of the other 13 books that he’s written and has for sale on Amazon. This is a must read for anyone who is serious about building a business and being efficient while doing it.

Influence by Robert Cialdini is one of the most informative books I’ve ever read. This book explains the exact reasons why people do what they do and how you can use that logic to get what you want. Every person who is trying to sell anything must read this book. It will really help you understand why certain wording and certain sales techniques are so effective. Humans are pre-wired to act a certain way. This book will explain how to tap in to that to get what you want out of them as well as how to prevent some of these techniques from working on you.

Unlimited Power by Anthony Robbins is an absolute classic in my library. I refer back to it very very often and I can’t get enough of it. I’m a big believer in NLP and Anthony Robbins was the person who introduced the concepts to me. The power that the human brain posses is just unfathomable. NLP, and the techniques that Anthony teaches, really help you to tap in to more of what your brain is really capable of. This book has instant fixes for nagging problems in your life. You will learn how to be more confident and successful in business. Anyone who reads this book will have a better life because of it.

The Go-Giver by Bob Burg and John David Mann is a great story. It tells the story of a man who is in a rut at work and, through meeting several new people, he completely turns his life around. The entire book is written as a fictional novel while, at the same time, explains a powerful concept about business and building strong connections with people. I’d almost like to say that this book explains how karma works although, good, proven practices tend to return good results. This book is really enjoyable to read and is one of the books that I’ve read cover to cover in one sitting. I just couldn’t put it down. When you’re down, you’ll put this book down feeling like you’ve just read a great story as well as learned a new concept that you can apply in your business immediately. This is an absolute must read!

I couldn’t make a list of my current favorite books without including The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferriss! This is probably on of my favorite books ever written. Tim does an absolutely amazing job at explaining exactly what steps he took to get out of a life he hated and in to a life where he travels the world, does the things he loves to do, and barely spends any time doing much work. Tim gives real world examples and resources that you can use immediately to get closer to your ideal lifestyle. There is absolutely no reason that anyone who wants to work for themselves should not read this book. You will find inspiration, amazing resources, and actionable ideas that you can use in your business immediately.

Do you have any other ideas for great gift ideas for marketers? What are you favorite books? Please share in the comments below. I’d love to hear your feedback. (Please no links to actual products. They won’t pass my spam filters).

You may be thinking to yourself, “But Matt, I’m a reader of your blog and I want ‘How To’ Posts.” You may think that’s what you want now… but it’s not really true…

In all actuality, people really want to see real world case studies… They want to see examples of exactly what worked for someone else so that they can take those ideas and those actions and implement them themselves.

When you were taking math classes in school, what was the better way to learn? Did you like it when your teacher said, “this is how you do this math problem, so remember it.” or did you prefer to receive the explanation of why it worked and how it would be applied in the real world? Maybe that’s not the best example… But you probably learned a heck of a lot better when you received the explanation as well as the application. This is what real case studies actually do. They give true examples of the application.

Not only do case studies give the “how to”, they give examples of exactly how the specific technique was applied in real life. They prove to your readers that the results that they are looking for really can be achieved by taking the same actions that you took.

What would you think would make for a better blog post?

Example A: How to build a mailing list really fast.
Example B: How I built my mailing list from 15 people to 2,000 people in 2 weeks.

One of those blog post titles sounds more appealing to you, doesn’t it?

Both of those blog posts are going to teach the exact same topic but one of them backs up the “how to” with real world results. This IS what your readers want to see. They want that “how to”… But they want it with a little bit of results to prove that something actually works.

I came to this realization when I looked over and saw what my current most popular posts are as of writing this. 2 of my top 5 posts are How I Got To Where I am Today and How I’ve Done What I’ve Done. I’ll admit that these aren’t the best titles for blog posts, however, they both have one thing in common… They are both stories about how I did something. They aren’t necessarily “how to” posts. They are posts about real world achievements and how I achieved them.

When you take a look at the success of the popular blog, Shoemoney, you’ll realize where its success came from. Go back to some of his oldest posts, right when his blog was starting to grow, you’ll realize that they are all case study posts about how he achieved various successes through PPC and ad campaigns.

If you step away from the internet marketing niche and look at something like the health niche… The blogs that get popular are the ones from people who were, at one time, out of shape and have done what it takes to get their bodies back to where they want them. One of my favorite health blogs is a site called ZenToFitness.com. Many of the posts on this blog are case studies of how they managed to overcome issues with their weight and health. They give you the steps by showing you how they implemented them themselves.

When people rethink their “how to” posts and convert them in to case study posts, they will find that they are creating material that people really love to read and can really get excited about. Think about this when you’re writing your next tutorial. You will be surprised at how much better of a response you receive from your post.

What are your thoughts on this subject? Do you prefer when how-to posts give real world examples in the form of case studies or do you think standard how-tos are good enough? Please leave your comments below.

After a lot of thinking and a lot of research, I decided that I was basically going to reinvent my blog. I basically decided I’m going to start over and take a completely different approach altogether.

The beginning of this is the complete redesign that you are currently looking at. I think it’s neat and clean and not too cluttered. I’d love to hear your opinions on it but I really like it.

I’m taking a brand new approach to how I market my blog as well. I’m going to put much more time and emphasis in to social marketing and making sure my blog is present everywhere. I’ve also brought a social element in to my blog with the Flickr photos in the sidebar as well as the new social media buttons across the top. On top of that, I started using a cool new tool that ensures my blog posts are syndicated across all of the popular social networks automatically. (I’ll talk about this tool in one of my next blog posts)

In regards to the questions that I asked a few weeks ago… I’ve made a few decisions on those. Some people didn’t like the idea of me discussing non-blogging / non-marketing topics, however, the overwhelming majority wanted to hear it all. Most people also believed that anywhere between three posts per week to one post per day was acceptable. However, anything beyond one post per day was too much and anything less than one post per week was too little.

To be pretty blunt… my decision is that I’m pretty much going to post what I want, when I want. If I’m in the mood to talk about health and fitness on my blog, I’m going to do it. The people who aren’t interested in hearing about it can simply skip that post and decide not to read it and jump back over when a post is more relevant to them. As far as frequency, I will probably rarely exceed one per day but I’m going to make an effort to do somewhere around five per week.

I’m going to worry less about the length of posts and more about just delivering cool content, ideas, stories, tools, videos, and more. I used to e-mail everyone whenever I did a new blog post. However, since I’m going to up the frequency of my posting, I’m probably not going to e-mail about every single blog post. I want to put more focus on getting people to subscribe to this blog through their favorite RSS readers. This will ensure that you’re always up to date with my latest posts every day. See the yellow button at the top of the page that says “Subscribe RSS”? If you click on that, you can subscribe to my blog with a favorite RSS reader or even have my latest blog posts sent to you via e-mail. It will be a great way to make sure your always up to date with what I have to say. (Trust me. I have a lot to say.)

Some upcoming blog post ideas:

• What blog readers really want to read (It’s not “how-to” articles).
• The fastest way to encourage loads of interaction on your blog.
• Christmas gift ideas for the bloggers and marketers in your life.
• Instant credibility and visibility by using this one idea.
• My productivity secrets. (This will probably be a long one)
• My favorite tools to integrate social marketing with my blog.

My list is several pages long… These are just a few ideas to expect over the next week and a half or so…

I always love hearing your thoughts and feedback. Please a comment below because I absolutely love reading what you have to say. Also… Please sign up as an RSS subscriber to ensure that you get all of my upcoming posts delivered to you. I promise that I will make it worth your while!

I basically took all of my favorite new features and made videos out of them so you can check them out and really see what this thing is capable of. Let me tell you… This thing is amazing! Check out the videos and then read below the videos. I’m doing a little contest and I’m actually going to give out a couple copies of EVP. Read below the videos for more details…

(Click in the bottom right-hand corner of the videos to watch in full screen)

Video 1 – Use EVP to create a video page with comments

Video 2 – EVP2 makes your videos go viral!

Video 3 – Make buttons or images pop-up outside your video

Video 4 – Create videos and give them to affiliates

EVP2 looks pretty damn cool right? Well guess what… I want to hook two people up with free copies of EVP2 on launch day! It’s really simple… There are only 3 things that you have to do to be eligible to win.

1. Click the “Like” button at the top of this page.
2. Leave a comment below explaining what you are most looking forward to in EVP2.
3. Opt-in to the early bird list for EVP2.

Pretty simple, right? Just do those three steps and you are eligible to win a free copy of Easy Video Player 2. I will announce the winners on October 18th, the day before EVP 2 launches. Good luck to everyone!

I’m really looking forward to reading all of your comments and answering any questions you may have about EVP2.

Easy Video Player / Elite Marketing Foundation
Recently I formed a new business with my long time friend, Josh Bartlett. We are in the process of creating a membership called The Elite Marketing Foundation. There’s already a lot of buzz going around the industry about this because we have several big name marketers lined up to take part and help create content. This is going to be a pretty ground-breaking program. Josh and I share the same business philosophies and ethics and we are going to aim to teach the fact that you can be a hugely successful marketer and be ethical at the same time. To teach this, we are going to be implementing some brand new technology that tracks progress, awards achievements, and continually encourages action. It will be set up in a way that pretty much guarantees that any person who takes action and follows through will succeed.

Anyway, before the Elite Marketing Foundation is officially released, I teamed up with Josh to help him make his launch of Easy Video Player as huge as possible. The new version of EVP has so many new features that I’m not even going to begin to explain them all. There’s just too many to list. Easy Video Player will be officially released on October 19th and anyone who grabs it will get a first look in to the Elite Marketing Foundation. That will be our official unveiling.

Why am I telling you all this? Well first off, I want you to be as excited about the Elite Marketing Foundation and Easy Video Player as I am and second off, I would love to see you help promote Easy Video Player. I won’t go in to detail here about how much money it can make you or how cool all the new features are… If you are interested in helping out check out this page that explains everything.

Autopilot Cash Formula is Closing For Good
Most of you have already grabbed the Autopilot Cash Formula and all of the kind feedback has been amazing. However, October 8th will be the last day that this program will be available. I am shutting the doors for good and I don’t think I will ever reopen them.

I know you’re probably thinking that this is some sort of scarcity tactic but it’s really not. I have decided that I am going to simplify my business. From this point on, I will have two flagship products. I am going to continue to focus on The WordPress Classroom (The program that started it all for me) and the Elite Marketing Foundation (my new joint venture with Josh). So in order to simplify, I’m going to lower the price a little and then leave sales open for the next week or so before closing it down for good.

Now… That basically concludes the announcement portion of this post. Now to the things that I need your opinion on

Do you care about my health?
About 3 1/2 weeks ago I discovered an online health program. I’m not going to mention the name of the product right now but it was being promoted by some really big name marketers. My health has been something that I’ve let slip over the past year or so since I quit my job. I stopped working out and I ate crap food constantly. Not unexpectedly, I packed on some pounds…

I found this product and decided, “yea… I’m going to start eating healthy again and I’m going to follow this exercise regimen. I’ve stuck with this consistently for around 3 1/2 weeks now and I’ve already noticed some great results. My friends and family think I’m crazy because I’ve sacrificed a lot of delicious foods and I’ve never missed a day working out.

I recently came to the conclusion that maintaining your health is almost identical to building and maintaining a successful online business. The same philosophies apply. It is all about discipline. If you have the discipline to do exactly what you know you need to do every single day, you will reach your goals. Don’t get sidetracked and always keep your eyes on the end goal and you will see results. Discipline is the key to success in anything you do. I can say with almost 100% certainty that most people who haven’t made it online, haven’t made it because they haven’t maintained the proper discipline to do everything that they know they should be doing every single day…

Anyway, before I go off on a rant here… My question to you is, do you care or would you be interested in hearing about my successes and struggles with fitness and becoming as healthy as I can be? I know you probably think that it has little to do with blogging or marketing but I tend think differently. I think it all ties together. I may even share the exact program I’m on now and possibly (scary) before & after photos.

I’d love to hear your opinions on the idea.

How often should a blogger post?
This is a strange question for me to ask because well… I run the WordPress Classroom. However, this is something that I’ve really struggled with. I have lots of great ideas for blog posts but I’m afraid to post too frequently.

On one hand, I can post constantly. I probably have enough ideas to make one post per day. However, if I do that, I’m afraid people will get overwhelmed. I won’t have as big of an audience per post. On the other hand, if I only post about once per month, I get a ton of comments and a ton of feedback on every single post. Everything I do gets a ton of exposure, however, I’m not sharing as much content as I would like to. It’s been a tough internal debate.

I would love to hear your feedback on how often someone should post. How often would you want to hear from me? Once per month, once per week, a few times per week? What do you think? Let’s get a discussion going about this specific topic because I really think that this is a common struggle.

If you want to hear from me a few times per week on this blog, just let me know. I just want to make sure you’ll keep coming back and reading what I have to say and leaving awesome comments. If you can promise me that, I’ll make sure to share with you more often and provide as much value as possible.

Do you want to meet up?
Last but not least, I just wanted to mention that I’m going to be hitting a couple seminars in November. If you want to meet up and talk business, let me know. Leave comments if you are going to be at either of these events.

I’ll be at the info-summit in Baltimore between November 11th and November 14th and I will be at AffiliateDotCom Live in Las Vegas between November 19th and November 21st. If you’re interested in meeting up and talking biz, just let me know. We can definitely work something out.

Quick Little Poll
Can you do me a huge favor and answer these questions in a comment below?
1) Would you be interested in hearing more about my journey to get healthy?
2) How often would you want to hear from me on this blog?
3) Will you be at info-summit or AffiliateDotCom Live?

Thanks so much and I can’t wait to read your comments. I will do my best to respond to everyone who posts!

It seems to us that most people have this strategy that consists of basically building a list as large as possible. Their number one focus in life is to build it bigger and bigger. While having a huge list is definitely not a bad thing, most people are putting their focus on the wrong thing. I’m sure you’ve heard by now that “the money is in the list”. You’ve probably also heard the counter-response that “the money is not in the list… it’s in the relationship that you have with the list”. Obviously, the second one is probably closer to the truth. Today I’m going to put a new spin on the idea…

Focus on Building Fans Instead of Gaining Subscribers.

When I talk about a fan, I’m referring to the people that purchase every product that you create just because you made it. These people have so much faith in you that they are willing to blindly purchase what you are selling simply because you made it and they trust that what you made will live up to the quality that they’ve come to expect from you. These fans will purchase products through your affiliate links because they trust you and that you would only recommend the best for them. One fan is worth infinitely more to you that even 100 subscribers on your list.

Think of Apple Computers… They have thousands (if not millions) of fans. There are people out there that will purchase every single product that Apple puts out just because it’s Apple and they’ve come to expect a certain level of quality and usability from them. We call these people Apple Fanboys / Fangirls (and day by day I’m becoming one too). When they put out an iPhone 4, hundreds of thousands of people who already have perfectly fine, working, iPhone 3s drop their old phone to go grab Apple’s latest new toy. It happens with each new product they put out… They have fans.

Another example would be the gaming company, Blizzard. They do games like WarCraft, StarCraft and Diablo. I’m a fan of their company. In my opinion, they’ve never released a bad game. As a result, I own every game they’ve ever released. I buy the games before even reading reviews because I’ve come to expect a certain level from them and they seem to never disappoint. I am a fan…

Let’s put some math behind the idea… Written on the white board on the wall in my office I have “1,000 FANS” written in huge writing. That goal has been on board for months and months now. It is my opinion that if I can build my business to the point where I have 1,000 fans, I will be set…

One fan can be worth any amount to you. I would say at the very minimum, 1 fan is worth $100 per year. Remember, a fan buys everything you release and also purchases most of what you recommend. You only need to sell 2 products in a year, valued at $50 each for one fan to be worth $100 per year. However, at this rate, 1,000 fans is equal to $100,000 per year to your business.

Realistically, though, one fan is probably worth more like $324 per year (or about $27 per month) to your business. So at 1,000 fans, you are probably closer to a business worth around $324,000 per year. At this rate, you only need about 309 true fans to have a $100,000 per year business….

It’s fun to play with these numbers. Obviously, people who only sell and promote really high-ticket items will have a higher value per fan. However, in the high-ticket market, one fan is probably a little harder to come by.

Are you starting to see how simple the concept of building a huge income becomes when your focus becomes building fans as opposed to building a list of subscribers?

How to create fans

There are a few simple rules that myself and Josh tend to follow. Do these things and you will be on your way to building a list of adoring fans.

1. Give tons and tons of high value content for free. Use your blog, create eBooks, make video tutorials, and record interviews. Then just give them away for free. People love to get for free what most other people probably charge to give. As long as the content is quality, people will stick around to see what you’re going to say or offer next. I do my best to share everything I know and learn and I usually give it away for free. The funny thing is, that has never hurt the sales of the products I sell. So don’t be afraid to share what you know for free. People will still pay to get even more details or to dig down a little deeper in to the concepts.

2. “Learn to love getting the short end of the stick” This is one of my favorite quotes and it comes from, fellow internet marketer, Eben Pagan. It basically means that when you do sell products, sell them for a lot less than you think they are worth. Have a philosophy of always over-delivering and make sure that when people purchase a product from you, they are always getting much more than they paid for.

3. Be customer service oriented. I still personally respond to most of my e-mails myself. I do my best to answer questions about my products or my ideas to the people who take the time to e-mail me and ask them. I’m not always the fastest at responding (I get a lot of e-mails) but I pretty much always get back to people. I hired people to manage my support desk as well. I want to make sure that even if I can’t respond quickly, you will get a quick response. No question goes unanswered and theres usually someone to answer quickly no matter what time you send it. These little details really solidify the confidence that people have in you and your business.

4. Never promote anything that you don’t know much about. Don’t jump on launches just because everyone else is promoting them and don’t agree to adswaps without knowing the product of the person you’re swapping with. Make sure that you do what you can to protect the list that you do have. Don’t violate the trust that you are working hard to build by sending crap that you don’t know much about. I’m not against promoting products, promoting launches or even doing adswaps. I just think that you should never mail anything to your list unless you are confident that it will benefit them. Don’t put your credibility with your list on the line by blindly mailing them everything that pops up to promote.

5. Always live up to the standards that you’ve created. If you are going to follow in these footsteps and build a business around creating fans and trust, make sure that any products that you put out continue to be high quality. Don’t let your true fans down. It may take only one misguided slip up to ruin that relationship. Don’t blow it.

Follow these steps and you will be well on your way to creating a huge list of fans. I know people with lists of 60,000 to 100,000 subscribers that get a worse response out of their lists than people with lists of a few hundred true fans. True, sustainable wealth comes from buildings fans and creating trust, not from making a list…

If you enjoyed this post, can you do me two huge favors? Click the “Like” button to let me know that you enjoyed it and leave a comment so we can further discuss it. What are you a fan of? Do you agree / disagree with this philosophy? Get your input heard.

As of this month, my blog has now been online for one year. In fact, my first post ever was on July 1st, 2009. It wasn’t until August of 2009, however, that I really started to make some good money online. I had several blogs running all over the internet that were making me a few hundred dollars per month total but the real income didn’t start coming until August of last year.

There was actually one simple thing that I started doing that turned everything around for me. In fact, the recent changes that I’ve made to my business and my online philosophies have been because I have been looking back on how I got to where I am today. My new standards and ideals are less of a reinvention and more of me just getting back to my roots.

The thing that I really started to do in July of last year that really paid off is that I started helping people… And I don’t mean that I charged for every piece of advice that I gave. I mean that I actively went in to forums and hunted down people that were looking for help. When I found them, I wrote up long explanations and, sometimes, even recorded videos of how they can solve their problem.

My timeline looked something like this:

2006-2009 – I made lots of blogs and built them to where they were making a combined total of a couple hundred dollars per month. This was not enough to pay the bills and when I lost my job in May of ’09, this was not going to cut it.

May 2009 – I discovered The Warrior Forum. I began to jump from one “make money online” method to another. I also began actively searching out people that had questions related to WordPress and blogging. I wrote long replies and tried to do whatever I could to help them solve their problems. I figured that if there was anything that I felt like I was an authority in, it was WordPress and blogging.

July 2009 – This is where things started to get exciting! I joined Alex Jeffrey’s coaching program using a credit card because I did not have the money in the bank to pay up front. One of the first things that Alex taught right in the beginning is that everyone needs to build a blog. The coaching program was great but there wasn’t a lot of explanation on exactly how to set up a blog…

This worked out perfect for me! I joined the right program at the right time. I jumped right in to the forum on day one and started offering to help anyone who needed it. I was able to help a very large majority of his students get their blogs up and cranking. I was the most active person in that forum.

I continued to record more and more videos for people so that I wouldn’t have to explain things twice. Eventually, I registered TheWordpressClassroom.com. I now had a place to send them to watch my training videos and collect opt-ins at the same time.

July was also the month that I set up MatthewWolfe.com. I wanted another venue to teach people but I wanted it to be a place where I can expand my teachings beyond just WordPress. MatthewWolfe.com allowed me to share my goals, my progress, my personal stories, and the general internet marketing tips that I’ve been learning along the way.

Since I was constantly going out of my way to help others, they reciprocated by visiting my blog, reading my ramblings, and leaving comments and feedback. This made my blog appear to be a very popular place right from the start. My search engine rankings climbed and when random visitors popped in off the search engines, they saw all of the of action going on. They decided this was a happening blog and they kept coming back. This created a momentum that has caused my blog to just keep on growing…

August 2009 – I opened the doors to the WordPress Classroom. I had no concept of what a launch was at this point… I literally just put the buy-now button up and started announcing it in the forums, on my blog, and to the very small mailing list that I had at the time (something like 300 subscribers).

I opened the doors late at night on August 1st, 2009. When I woke up in the morning on August 2nd, I looked in my Paypal account and started jumping up and down and dancing like crazy. I had 20 people join The WordPress Classroom over night. That was the first time that I ever made more than $100 in a single day online. This wasn’t a million dollar launch and I still haven’t paid off my mortgage but this was the day that I realized that I was going to have a legitimate online business. I knew from that point, that this would turn in to something much bigger.

From that point on it’s been somewhat of a blur. I kept working on more and more ways to get people to visit the site. I was introduced to the concepts of things like adswaps and JV giveaways. I also learned that I could sell The WordPress Classroom on the Warrior Forum, where I had originally gotten my start, and get it in front of a very targeted audience. That was a huge revelation for me and it eventually led to my first $1,000 day.

In April of this year, I launched The Autopilot Cash Formula which basically taught people the business model behind The WordPress Classroom. This time I followed the full launch process and had another huge success. It was a great product and it received a great reception but I always felt like The WordPress Classroom was my baby… If it wasn’t for me trying to teach people WordPress, I wouldn’t be anywhere today…

This leads me to where I am now. I have completely decided to go back to my roots. Hopefully, this has become evident by the fact that I’ve refocused my e-mail campaigns to almost nothing but cool free content. I’ve also shifted the majority of my focus on what got me to where I am today… The WordPress Classroom.

The WordPress Classroom has come a long way! It has just passed 750 members. To make things even better, I don’t think I’ve ever had one person tell me that they were unhappy with it.

Just this last week, I opened the WordPress Classroom 2.0 which features new videos, new themes, a new layout, and, best of all, a brand new forum where myself and the members can do the one main thing that got me to where I am today… Help people.

If you are interested in The WordPress Classroom, you can learn more by clicking this link. Check out the new design and the free videos that I’ve provided. If you feel like upgrading, there’s a special bonus offer in there too.

I am so grateful to be where I am today and if you intend to make a good living online, the best advice that I can give is to help as many people as possible. I give you my 100% guarantee that it will pay off!

“You will get all you want in life if you help enough other people get what they want.” – Zig Ziglar

If you like this post, do me a huge favor and click the “like” button. Please leave your comments. I love reading your feedback!