Somebody offered me a free video the other day. The promise was
that I would learn a fantastic new traffic technique and it would
cost me absolutely nothing.

I took the bait and followed the link.

What I came to was a squeeze page that had a very short
promotional video on it telling me about the benefits of the
‘free’ video. But to watch the free video I had to give them my
name and email address.

Okay, I have no problem with that. I’m a marketer too – I
understand about squeeze pages and list building. No problem.

But then I was taken to an upsell that was trying to sell me
something I had no idea what it was, and had no interest in
finding out.

I was there to see a free video, after all!

Eventually I found the ‘No Thanks’ link and so settled down to
watch the video I’d wanted to see five minutes ago.

But no. There was another sales page trying to make me buy a
cheaper version of the first upsell. I didn’t want it then and I
don’t want it now! Enough already!

Finally … finally … I got to the page the original email had
promised and watched the video. It was quite interesting, as it
turned out, although not quite as ‘new and revolutionary’ as the
author seemed to think.

What a palaver! Four clicks, two upsells, a name squeeze and a
promotional, pre-video to sit through. All to watch a short free
video.

I wish I hadn’t bothered.

I know it is marketing. I know that the gurus teach this stuff. I
know that it is effective. Heck, I know that the guy running it
is probably making ten times what I am.

But despite all that, it is still bloody annoying. Surely there
is a better way?

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A few months ago I mentioned that one of the best long-term
business plans I have ever come across is lead generation. There
are thousands of businesses out there who are very happy to pay
significant amounts of cash for hot leads – and we have the
skills, via the Internet to generate an endless supply of them.

I told the story of a roofing contractor who came to fix my
gutters. He told me that he buys ten leads every week from a
company that gets them over the Internet. He pays £33
per lead (a bit over $50) and he is quite happy that the company
selling them to him sells the same leads to two other
companies as well.

That company is making more than $150 per lead, and have told my
guy that they can supply up to 60 fresh, unique leads each and
every week if he wanted that many.

And that is just in the very small market of people looking to
have a new flat roof installed.

Judging from the roofer – and the manager of a
conservatory-building company I also spoke to the other day –
selling these leads is the easiest thing in the world! Companies
are lining up to buy.

The particular lead company I saw offers leads in dozens of
different building-related specialities: driveways, windows,
conservatories, plumbing, decorating, you name it, they can
provide tradespeople with leads for it.

Imagine how much they are raking in!

I wish I could remember the URL of their website – you would be
amazed at how simple it was.

When I wrote about this in Kickstart back in September (I think)
I got loads of emails from people asking for more information.

One of my good online friends, Mark Vurnum, has been incredibly
successful with exactly this business model for the past few
years. He makes simple websites that suck in leads for all kinds
of businesses, which he then sells on for a considerable income.

Of course, Mark doesn’t restrict himself to the building
industry, and neither should you – there are all kinds of
businesses out there who are crying out for leads, and who are
very happy to pay a significant amount for each one.

A year or two ago, Mark created a training course on lead
generation, called Lead Generation Videos, and it was a big hit.
He followed up with a second, updated course called Lead
Generation Videos 2, which was equally popular.

Those course now form the basis of his Lead Generation Blueprint
membership site – and very good that is too!

But that’s not what I’m writing about today.

Just this week, Mark has come out with Lead Generation Videos 3.

Don’t be deceived by his spectacular lack of imagination in
naming his products! Lead Generation Videos 3 takes the whole
process to a completely different level.

Make no mistake, I could have started 2010 by
recommending any one of a dozen hot new products, but having
looked around, I really can’t think of anything that has the
potential to start this year with more impact.

And guess what?

It is free.

Well almost. You can get Mark’s Lead Generation 3 video for just
the cost of the postage (it comes to you on a DVD). I’ve just
finished watching it – it is 66 minutes long – and can tell you
that there is no fluff at all. Mark explains very clearly and
comprehensively how to create very high ranking websites that you
can then ‘rent’ out to local businesses.

It doesn’t replace his lead generation strategies, but does
provide a very easy to put-into-action alternative method of
profiting massively from local offline businesses.

You also get a free trial to Mark’ Lead Generation Blueprint
membership site that does give you everything you need to know
about the core lead generation business plan.

It is well worth getting the new video just to see inside the
membership site!

There are all kind of high ticket launches going on this month
and you will be bombarded with emails about them. There are also
several ‘giveaways’ where you can get a ton of stuff you don’t
really want or need in exchange for your precious email address.
100 free products just means 100 more people who will incessantly
send you junk.

But you won’t hear about any of them from me.

My number one aim has always been to tell you about the best
stuff out there – the products that can really make a big
positive difference to your life. Lead Generation Videos 3 is my
selection for the very first thing to tell you about in 2010
because it is something you can easily, cheaply and effectively
put into place right away and see great results.

Oh, and don’t worry that the product comes to you on a DVD – it
is great to have a hard copy to put on your shelf and refer to
later, but you can access the video instantly too.

In just over an hour from now you will be able to start building
your own rental websites – there is no skill needed and Mark
guides you through every step of the process.

In case you are wondering, even if every single Kickstart reader
started using this strategy today, the chances of anyone being in
competition with you is minimal – and not a problem anyway. This
is a vast market with massive potential.

Lead Generation Videos 3 is yours for the small price of postage.
Order your copy right now: http://urlnex.us/leadgen3

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I read a thread on the Warrior Forum yesterday that was started
by a guy who says he has ‘tried everything’ to make money online,
but in 2 years of effort has only managed to make about $100.

Not surprisingly, he was asking if he should give up and go try
something else, or if it really is possible and he has just been
doing the wrong things.

The replies were somewhat polarized. Some people said to carry
on, but to focus more. Others said that Internet marketing
clearly isn’t for him and that he should give up right away.

My own view is that if he truly has only made $100 in two years,
he is doing something radically wrong. There must be something
about the process of online marketing that he simply hasn’t
understood.

Of course, without more detailed knowledge of what the guy has
already done, and how he has done it, no advice can be of use to
him.

In general though, while I accept that there is a learning curve,
I can’t see any reason why somebody shouldn’t be able to make
regular income within 6 months of starting out.

The trouble is that many people secretly don’t believe that it is
possible. They subconsciously put up barriers in their own minds.
They over think and over analyze everything to the point that
they either don’t do the things they need to do, or they spend so
long on the unimportant trivial stuff that they forget to take
action on what really counts.

I was just the same. It took me a while to ‘get it’ when I
started out and I remember the frustration of thinking that I was
doing everything right but still making nothing, when all around
me I could see people apparently doing the same things that I
was, but making a fortune.

In the end I learned the most important thing of my online life:
that if I thought I was doing the same things as other people and
they were successful with it but I wasn’t, then the problem was
that I didn’t understand the process properly. Somewhere along
the line I was doing something differently and success would come
when I identified my own error and corrected it.

Making money online is simple, but it isn’t necessarily easy.

None of the steps you have to take are particularly complicated –
so long as you don’t over think them – but there are a lot of
steps and the potential for doing them wrong, or in the wrong
order, is high.

Internet marketing can be defined like this:

Learn what problems people use the Internet to solve and provide
them a solution.

Everything you need to know about online marketing is contained
in those 14 words, but most importantly, in their order.

First comes learning what their problems are.

Most people who try, but ultimately fail to succeed online don’t
start in the right place. They start out by listening to the
worst advice anyone ever gave: go with your passion.

Your passion is only of value or relevance if it solves the #1
question: what someone else is searching for an answer to.

I might be the world’s leading expert on snail mating behaviour
and think it is the most interesting subject known to man. But
despite my total enthusiasm, the chances of anyone ever wanting
to buy my latest ebook on how to breed snails is slim. There
might be a handful of French food enthusiasts, but not enough for
me to start an online empire from!

No. Forget your passions and look for other people’s problems.

Problems come in all shapes and sizes – from curing a disease to
finding a good price for a camera and our objective is to find
one that lots of people share that we can find or create a
solution to.

That is the #1 principle of marketing, whether online or off.

How do you find the problems people have?

Simple – Use Google’s keyword tool. (Google “keyword tool” and it
will be the #1 listing.)

Enter “How to” or “How do I” or “Where can I” and you’ll
instantly have enough problems to last you a lifetime!

The next trick is to decide which ones are worth pursuing! But
that’s a question for another article.

One thing I will say now though is that you must get common sense
on your side and think like a marketer.

For example, one of the top questions people are asking is ‘how
to kiss’.

With hundreds of thousands of people searching for the answer to
that particular problem, you might think that there is a huge
market ready to buy your latest practical e-guide. But think
about it for a minute and you’ll realize that the vast majority
of the people searching for that are going to be teenagers – and
kids don’t generally have credit cards or PayPal accounts.

Even offline marketers make that mistake all the time. I worked
with a company once that gave reward points that could be
redeemed for discounts on CDs. Their fatal flaw was that their
audience was 12-16 year old boys and the redemption could only be
done via a credit card purchase. Wasn’t going to happen!

But carry on down the how to list a little way and you’ll find
that ‘how to make pancakes’ is a very popular search.

Sure, there are endless free recipes online, but you can say the
same thing about chocolate cake too – and there is an ebook that
has been selling well on ClickBank for at least the last 6 years
on how to make the world’s best chocolate cake. (I bought it and
the recipe is almost impossible to get right!)

Could a report or video on how to make the world’s yummiest
pancakes sell for a few dollars? It might be worth a try – and
won’t cost much to find out.

It is a real problem for millions of people and maybe you can
provide (or appear to provide – which is what marketing is all
about) a unique solution.

So, to wrap up, whether you’ve been failing online for two years
or have just started out on this exciting journey, success will
come by getting all the simple steps in the right order. And the
first simple step is to put the other person’s problem at the
very beginning of what you do.

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