You’ve heard it over and over, “The Money is in the List”, followed by some sort of pitch for a list-building product or system.

That’s what Internet Marketers have been pitching for years… And, in a general sense, they are absolutely correct. If you don’t have a list of prospects or customers, you will not be able to generate as much revenue as you can without one.

All Lists are not created equal.

But, having a list and having a Good List are not the same thing.

Some companies make their living by providing lists. They collect email addresses and contact information using their specialized methods, and then offer them to you for a price. It is a good business model, one that has been around for decades. Someone wants to promote to a certain market, and these lists can help.

But, regardless of how well-targeted they are, each of those contacts on the list are cold-calls for you. None of them have ever heard of you, let alone be interested in anything you have to say. These aren’t Prospects, they’re Suspects. I suspect you’ll not get much Respect from them.

Your approach to this list is like tossing mud against the wall and seeing how much will stick. What a great way to treat your potential customers.

The Real List

Your Real List is one that contains people who know you – who have elected to hear from you – at least once. They are receptive to an approach if not an offer. They are Prospects, not Suspects.

You get these Prospects by enticing them to Opt IN to your newsletter, or email tips or to get your free Report. You have built in them enough interest or trust that they WANT to hear more from you.

Instead of finding them and cold-calling until they submit, they have found you through their interest in your niche. They sought your topic out of the Internet, and here they are. NOW you get to impress them with your knowledge and command of the topic – your Authority.

The Money Is In the Relationships

It is better to have the name of someone who knows you than is is to have just a name. It is better to get them to know you through meaningful contacts than to bulk-blast them with junk.

As you collect names of those interested in your topic, you begin to develop in them a special relationship. You are helpful. you are interesting, you are unique. You continue to tell the truth.

You can’t force them to become your friend, but you can help them trust you and your information.

Trust Is the Crucial Key.

Everybody wants to make a sale. Not everybody wants to make an effort.

It takes dedication and long hours devoted to building trusting business relationships. Trust is hard to develop and easy to lose. Your battle is not with your competitors, but with yourself. You need to be truthful and trusting at every turn.

Claim to have a guarantee? Better honor it faster than you promise. Claim to show the true path? Better have all the trail signs in place and complete. Claim to be interested in their success? Better prove it by offering success tools.

Step away from any one of your promises for even a second, and BAM! your trust dissolves. And you won’t get a second chance to rebuild it.

Make New Friends, but Keep the Old.

This comes from a song we used to sing around the campfires. One is Silver, and the Other is Gold. And you can’t tell the difference.

As you establish relationships, make it your goal to be friendly and helpful, and to retain as many Prospects on your list as possible. Keep them by offering them truth and value.

Establish routines that allow you to contact them with useful information. Keep your interactions low-key, and don’t flood their inbox with selling.

And seek out new Prospects. Always be prospecting, and converting them into fans.

Conclusion

It isn’t the LIST, it’s who is IN the list. If they seek you out, don’t let them down. Treat them like you want to be treated.

Why Not?

Because I regularly confuse Activity with Productivity.

Productivity

Productivity is the execution of events or processes that accomplish progress towards goals. Productivity is getting the RIGHT stuff done. Productivity adds Value to your life.

When I am productive, I end the day feeling good about what got done. When I am productive, I can see the pile of un-done, important work shrink in size. When I am productive, my bank account gets refreshed.

Productivity is the science of Getting Stuff Done. But it is getting the Right Stuff done that is important.

Activity

Why do I see just random action, or even focused action without connection to any goals, as effective, or even desirable at all? I can sit all day long, checking email, surfing around a bit, shuffling papers, day-dreaming (I mean brainstorming) and KNOW that I should be doing something else – and yet, not do it.

What’s with that?

What am I trying to avoid? Do I see that real productivity is somehow going to interfere with my freedom? My freedom to choose what to do? My freedom to be a lazy slug? My freedom to spiral into mediocrity?

Solution

I’m certainly the one in charge of my day. What better way to use it than to move down the road a little farther?!? After all, if the goal is worthy, the journey is fulfilling.

The solution is to train my mind to reject activity to pass the time. The solution is to train my mind to use age-old, proven tools to keep myself on track. The solution is to grow up and get on with life.

Start with the End in mind. Make a Written Plan for how to reach that End. Break that Plan into Daily chunks. Put that Daily Chunk before me so I can focus on it. Take the first step, this day, on today’s most important activity – being productive.;

My Goal?

What is my goal? At this stage in my life, I only want to run strong after the Lord. I’ve raised my family, I’ve had my career, I’ve made my fortune. Now, I have the time-freedom and the financial means to accomplish things I passed over in the years behind me.

I can now hear the voice of the Lord calling me to help other people get their lives in order by getting out of debt. I have the knowledge. I have the skills. I have the Attitude.

I now need to develop the tools.

Conclusion

If you spend your days in foggy confusion, being busy all day, but in the end, doing nothing, then you need to fix it.

What do you really want out of life? What is the most important thing you can be doing, this minute, to make a difference in your life and the lives of others? What should you be doing, Right Now, to get farther down the road to your goal?

Mark it down. Keep it posted. Get Stuff Done.

JohnL

Turns out I’m OK, but that doesn’t end the concern.

I naturally thought about how my personal health affects the health of my business. Then, about business health in general. How do you measure and improve it?

Attributes of a Healthy Business

What is it about a business that marks it as healthy? What characteristics make it ready for the long haul? What are the indicators to watch for to remain healthy?

1. Profits – At the end of any given day, a business has to be making a profit, or it won’t survive. Look at GM and Chrysler, lately. They have sustained massive losses over the years. They can’t make it up in volume. They finally had to bow to the truth and file Chapter 11 Bankruptcy. I don’t foresee those losses ever being earned back, let alone being paid back to the out-of-luck lenders.

Make sure you have a suitable bookkeeping system in place, and stay up-to-date on the entries. Be sure to pull an Income Statement every month, or every quarter at the latest. This statement allows you to look back on how your operations fared in the marketplace.

Profits? Good news. Are they enough? That’s the next indicator.

2. Plan – Do you have a Business Plan, and are you keeping up with it? Do you regularly review the Plan’s action steps? Do you update the Plan with new information? Are you keeping pace with the projections? If not, why not?

Do you have a Weekly and Daily Plan to work from? Do you know what you are going to be doing, today, to improve your business?

3. People – Are your employees helping your business, or are they hindering it? Do you have a hiring plan in place, or do you hire randomly? Do you have a defined and routine employee evaluation process? When you find an employee who is below par, do you coach them to improvement? Do you replace them if it doesn’t work out? Or do you collect dead wood – holding on to dud employees for a later fire sale when you go out of business?

4. Customers – Is your customer base growing? Are you serving more and more customers with better and better service? Do you have a Referral program or Loyalty program in place? Does your sales process capture customer information so you can follow up with them with later contacts?

What Else Measures Health?

This basic list of attributes will help you start measuring your business health. There are many more you can use depending on your business.

What are some of the ways YOU measure business health?

JohnL

I usually get the coffee started and then open the house & curtains, and get the paper. Then I sit down at my PC and start the day.

Today was different.

After opening the house, and before sitting at my PC, I put in a few minutes just thinking about what needed to be completed by the end of the day. I thought about what processes I would employ during the day. I thought about how to avoid the time-sinks that each of us has – mine unique to me, but identical to yours.

During this time, I also thought about what I wanted this week to look like at the end of it. How would it stand up to backward scrutiny? What did I want to be able to write down as accomplishments during a weekly review?

That few minutes of reflection helped me stay on track for longer than usual, and I got quite a bit done that I might not have, otherwise.

I put in the time pre-planning my day.

What’s the big deal? Doesn’t everybody do this?

No.

Most people go through the day allowing random circumstances and events to sway their course and dictate their responses. Most people do NOT plan their day, but allow others to do it for them. In fact, most people EXPECT to have others tell them what needs to be done, and when.

The problem with this for the entrepreneur is that there is nobody to do this for you. Sure, the customer will have plenty to tell you, but that core response is why you are in business. In order to make your business more effective and you more successful, you have to spend time outside of customer-satisfying activities to plan and do improvement projects.

If you don’t take the time, you won’t do the work. it will slip away until the daylight fades with your willpower along with it. The lost opportunity to do SOME-thing to improve will cost you in the long run.

Put in the Time every day, to figure out at least ONE project you can complete that will have a positive effect on your business. Just One.

I’m going to do it again in the morning… How about you?

John L

 Congratulations on stepping out for more independence. We’ve been selling online for about 5 years, and find the freedom and flexibility it gives us to be wonderful. I hope you can weather the frustrations (like you’ve encountered early) and reach some profitability. I’m happy to help as I can.

We personally don’t do any drop-shipping, but we try to own and ship our own products. However, I usually advise that you begin by selling a product that people buy… (An author once wrote about writing… “I usually try to leave out the words that people don’t read…)

Success in online marketing is the same as in a regular store: Have the Right Product at the Right Price at the Right Time.

I’m  pretty confident that just about anything you select as viable will continue to sell during recessions. If you had a regular store, then I’d worry. But, the Internet is such a great, big, pool of potential customers, that you’ll pretty much always find plenty of people whose life-decisions have included your product as an essential purchase.

But, selecting products (or first markets) is the most important decision to make in launching any business. Online is no different. I usually advise that you begin the process by writing down areas that you enjoy or that you know something about. You can sell what you know better than what you know nothing about. Credibility and authority are vital in an online business.

For example, I know about and enjoy tools and wood-crafting, but I don’t much enjoy fabric and sewing. (Sandi does.) Both are sort of crafty and creative, but different people are attracted to each of these areas, and not many are attracted to both. This begins to define an available market for me to try to serve. Your list should include several to choose from. 

Next, I think of all the kinds of problems, or solutions to problems, or gaps in what the market offers inside this market area. I try not to think from my own perspective, but from the general public. (A fisherman doesn’t bait his hook with food the fisherman likes, but with food the fish like…)

I look online for forums or blogs that specialize in my selected market, and I review the postings and comments – looking for these gaps or opportunities. Look on Yahoo Answers to see what people might be looking for to buy. This is all valuable research that will help you zero in on the right products to evaluate.

Then, you can begin to evaluate products in terms of price, profitability, and marketing methods.

Your Market comes before Product. Potential Profits come before Products.

Now, removing your own thoughts and feelings about what might be “cool” or desirable, select your product(s) to begin selling. Your market should determine the products, not you. You are only one out of the potential thousands of customers you need to please.

I hope this is helpful. Please let me know how else I can help.

John L

I had a lightbulb “doh!” moment a few days ago. I’d like to share so maybe you won’t hurt yourself slapping your own forehead.

eBay’s Changing Environment

eBay, in its own efforts to attract more high-volume Sellers and to settle the fears of new Buyers, has been re-working various fees and listing policies. Most notoriously, they have removed the option for a Buyer to use personal checks or Money orders as a method of payment, and forced most Sellers to accept PayPal as their only means of payment.

But, eBay has also raised the Final Value Fees on items sold from a Store, lowered the fees to List a Fixed Price item, and the fees for any Book or CD/DVD.

This is all wonderful and confusing and maddening and generating “who-knows-what-this-will-do-to-MY-business” howls from Sellers of every business level.

One change we have taken advantage of is the new Fixed Price Listing fee structure. They are now just a Flat Fee. For a single price of $0.35, we can create a Fixed Price Listing offering unlimited number of the item. It used to be based on the Total represented by the cost times the quantity. Now – Flat Fee for any quantity/price offering.

Yay!

The Gold Among Dross Secret

But, buried in these changes was a simple concept that I had overlooked or dismissed as not important.

Was I ever wrong.

It was a simple change to a previously forbidden or very restrictive policy. This is found in their “Circumventing Fees” examples.

Choice Listings - A listing where a seller allows buyers to choose from a selection of completely different items.  In general, sellers are permitted to offer a choice of sizes, colors and configurations of a particular item within a listing,  However, a listing may not offer buyers a choice of completely different items.

This is the final piece:

Listing a single item but offering additional identical items for sale in the item description is not permitted.

Exception: Multiple quantities may be sold in one listing through the following formats:

• Dutch auction-type listing
• Fixed Price listing
• Lot listing

So What?

As it turns out, we sell primarily Brand New items. We do a good buying job, and then offer them on eBay and our other online store, www.bobbibopstuff.com.

We sell 8 different designs of the same Locking Diary for teens. We sell a dozen different designs of Blank Book Journals. We sell several items that are identical except for design or color.

All Righty Then!

My lightbulb is that I now only need to create a single listing for Teen Diaries, show all the design choices, and ask the Buyer to indicate how many of each design they want.

I can then keep track of how many are left. As we run out of a particular design (which happens far more often that I generally keep track of) I can modify the hosted photo of that design to say “Sold Out” and then any and all my listings with that design are current as to availability.Ordinarily, I will have 3 or 4 listings of a design, sell out, and then have to find and cancel the remaining ones – wasting the listing fees in the process.

WooHoo! I cut my listings to only a fraction of my previous number and I keep track of inventory all in one swell foop.

Conclusion

What did I learn from this? Sure – I learned a technique for saving eBay fees.

Mostly, I learned to look a bit more slowly at the fine print, and to think more seriously about always finding ways to improve my business. Saving a dime is a dime more of profit. Save enough dimes, and the Profit dollars begin to add up.

What did you learn?

John L

“Do Something EVERY Day Towards Accomplishing Your Goal!”

And I’m pretty good at doing Something. It just might not be towards a higher priority.

Why Priorities Are Important

The trouble with not having clear Priorities, is that without them, you lose a very important filter with which to evaluate competing tasks or events. You use filters or biases all day long when you subconsciously choose what to do, to think, to say, to ignore, or to avoid. These filters are your past actions and experience, and current “known” priorities. By “known” I mean that they are currently occupying space in your conscious thought.

If your Priority is to stay healthy, then this filter helps you put down the donut, and pick up the carrot. But, if you haven’t pre-programmed your conscious thoughts to be aware of your eating habits, then the donut is gone, and you are left with regrets, not results.

You Want Results, not Regrets.

After all, results are the tangible indication that your efforts have been effective.

Being Effective means that you have been working on the right things. Right things are the tasks and actions that move you towards your goal, that provide momentum and progress. You feel better about your day when you see that Progress.

When I end my day, I want to look back and see my footprints on the path of progress. I don’t want to see a wandering mishmash of confusion or random happenings. I want to feel satisfied that I didn’t waste my day wasting my time. I want to feel that satisfaction of “Yes! I Did IT!”

Results each day bring you closer to your goals. Priorities keep you focused on those Right Things to do.

Your Highest Priorities In Business

There are only Three.

1. Cash
2. Content (Your Product or Service)
3. Customers

If you need something to help you focus on what to do, these are your filters. Use them every day.

The Importance of Cash

If you don’t have any Cash, then your ONLY Priority is to get some.

“Cash is King!” That motto summarizes this Priority. If you don’t have any Cash, you will be out of business in a very short time. You need cash to do most anything in business.

I spent $89 – in cash – to get my business LLC paperwork prepared and filed. I spend $7.00 every month – in cash – to have this website hosted. (Is that a good expense?) My car (which I bought with cash) takes gasoline to run, which takes cash to buy. Cash is ALWAYS required to keep business going.

“What about credit and lines of credit?” What about them? They provide a source of cash you can use, temporarily, to keep business going, but it takes Cash to pay it all off. Ultimately, you have to generate more cash than you borrowed so you can stay in business.

The Federal Bailouts are providing an infusion of cash into various segments of the national economy. But the bailouts are funded by debt, not cash. Someone, somehow, some-when will have to end up forking over cash-money to pay these bailouts off.

So, if your business has no cash, your highest priority is to get some.

Credit or a loan is an acceptable short-term solution, as long as your long-term plan has all this paid off – using excess cash from your business revenues.

Saving or conserving cash from your existing cashflow is an even more acceptable method. Just because you have it doesn’t mean you need to spend it. The Dotcom bust of the early century wasn’t a failure because of lack of cash. No. Most every dotcom venture was awash in it from eager investors. But, management, being unused to actually running a business and handling large sums of cash, ‘burned” it all up by spending on Cool Stuff. They didn’t have the next 2 Priorities fixed in their operations.

Cash is King. If you don’t have any, get some – NOW – and then keep as much of it as you can.

You Gotta Sell Something

If you have Cash, then you can focus on your Second Priority, Content or Product. If you don’t have a Product, then your ONLY priority is to get some. I call this Content.

Your Content (I’m using this generically to include products and services, too) is what you will sell to continue generating Cash. No Content, eventually, no Cash, and then, no Business. But, remember Priority One – Don’t pay too much for your Content.

If you are planning to sell physical products, then you need to find and cultivate relationships with manufacturers or distributors or wholesalers of the kinds of products you intend to sell. You need to select, not settle, on a line of products that complement and supplement each other. Your product line is You in the marketplace.

If you invented something and want to sell it, then your priority is to find a manufacturer that will produce your product for you. A friend of mine invented a geehaw in his spare time. He had me help him make a prototype for his patent application. He took that prototype to trade shows to see if he could sell it – no go. He decided to produce it himself. He has now interviewed and selected a jobshop that will produce and package for him at a cost he can afford. He NOW has a product. He is actually on the road, now, paying attention to the Third Priority.

If your intention is to sell eBooks on the internet, then you need to buy, or create your eBook. You need to write Every Day until it is done. If your intent is to make money selling advertising on your Blog, then write, write, write.

If you are offering your services, then clearly define what you will be doing and how much you will be charging and what you will NOT be doing or what will cost Extra.

You are in control of your content. Be sure you can verbalize it in a short sentence or motto. Be sure you can paint word pictures to describe it. Be sure you can be distinguishable from all the other Sellers in your market.

Get your Content or Products solidified and available.

Who Are You Going To Sell It To?

“The Customer is King!”

Without a Customer, your product languishes on the shelf, your loans come due, your babies go hungry, and you fail. WITH a customer, your product becomes known, your loans are all paid off, and your babies attend Harvard – you succeed.

If you have some cash, and you have your product, then pursue your Third Priority. If you don’t have any Customers, then your ONLY Priority is to get some.

If your business is local, then you need to do local stuff to find and secure your customers. Conserve Cash, and go door-to-door if necessary to get your customers. Use the phone. Post notices on bulletin boards. Signs and Posters in your store-front. CraigsList.

If your business is online, then build a great website with good Search Engine Optimization. Visit and participate in Forums where your likely customers hang out. Write articles and Blog entries to help solve people’s problems. Get your name and business out there as being the Expert in your field.

Answer every email. Follow up on every lead. Ask for referrals from every lead. Be vigorous and relentless in your pursuit of Customers.

Repeat

The reality is that every day brings these three priorities into conflict. That’s OK. Because if you know these are your Priorities, using them as a filter to examine your daily activities will always lead towards successful progress. Ignoring these filters will bring you to eventual ruin.

Focus on Cash, Customers, and Content – All day, Every Day. Success is yours.

Non-focus or wandering around leads to dead-ends, no cash, and Failure.

Be successful.

John L

It is easy to point to external circumstances as reasons why failure is inevitable or acceptable. The elected administrations are  seen as the cause or the cure for the economic environment. That environment is seen as the key factor in business success.

I say, No.

Yes, the macro or big-picture economy is important to business success. But, unless you are engaged in the collapsing housing and mortgage markets, it isn’t as important as you fear.

Your business has customers and competitors. Let your competitors cower in fear. YOU take stock and chart a safe course through the tumult, and expand into their market. While you’re at it, take their customers, too.

You see, everybody makes their economic decisions, not on the general economy, but on their own personal circumstances. Sure, the news on Wall Street will have impact on those decisions. But it is the bills in the mail, the price of gas, and the boss at work that have more impact.

So, whether your guy won or not should cheer or disappoint you. But, don’t count on him to solve your economic problems. After all. It’s YOUR business, not his.

Make your plans with alternatives to counter higher prices. Decide how to plan for manpower. Be creative and discover ways to better communicate to your market that you are still there and willing to help them out. There will always be customers who are above the economics and will continue to darken your door. You just have to keep finding them.

It is your business. You have no business letting its success hinge on the decisions and actions of that guy in the Whitehouse – whether you voted for him or not. Your responsibility is to make it work in SPITE of what goes on in Washington. You have commitments to meet, customers to serve, and employees who depend on you.

Don’t let them down.

But, as much as I hate to admit it, there are others with plenty more knowledge and experience you can learn from. I learn every day.

One of them is Jack Humphrey. He runs a Blog of breaking and important marketing information, focused mostly on using social sites to better advantage. He is also the force behind the Authority Site Center.

But, he, too, refers to others to become more informed and skilled in marketing. He posted a list of his Top-7 Marketing Blogs. You can read it here: The Best Marketing Blogs Right Now.

Some of them you might already read regularly. I found some I had not seen before, and have added them to my reading list.

You should do the same.

John L