Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on the Internet
A TalkBiz Review by Paul Myers
Title : Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on the Internet
Author : Corey Rudl
Price : $197 + $20 S/H
Publisher : Internet Marketing Center
URL : http://www.marketingtips.com/sr/t.x/4684/
First, the usual "full disclosure". Yes, I am an affiliate
distributor in the program Mr Rudl offers. So you may want to
take much of this with a grain of salt. I won't be offended at
all, I promise.
Yes, I paid for the product rather than receiving a free review copy.
This is the second product I have purchased with the primary
purpose in mind being a review. I expected to learn a bit, but I
have seen way too many people reprinting that silly "personal
recommendation" note that claims the publisher has known Mr Rudl
for ages, blah blah, yadda yadda. Lots of fluff and nice words,
but nothing solid in it to help a potential buyer decide if the
thing is worth having *for them*.
I have to wonder how many of those people reprinting that
"personal recommendation" had even gotten the book. (A lot
hadn't, I'm sure.)
On to the review....
First glance: The package was pretty hefty. Two 2" binders, with
@ 490 pages of printed information, 4 floppy disks, a cassette
and two coupons.
Nice packaging. Professional. Forget the disks. They're a good
example of adding perceived value. Or at least 3 of them. There's
some useful links on disk two.
One disk has a list of Compuserve forums that might be useful,
but the rest isn't worth messing with. Especially the email
address extractor program. The only time I could get it to work
right was when I fed it a file consisting of nothing but email
addresses that had already been cut to one per line. Do yourself
a favor, if you need a program to extract addresses from a file,
get one off the net. Forget this one. Even if it worked, it's got
nothing else to recommend it.
(Yes, there *are* legitimate uses for such a program that
don't involve spamming...)
On the flip side, the useless stuff on those disks is more than
made up for by the fact that Mr Rudl has made a program available
from his website that would otherwise be unavailable. A rather
nifty twist on the desktop search program theme that I can see
saving me a lot of time. It will do a multi-engine search and
save the results to a formatted html file on your drive for later
perusal.
The cassette is a nice touch. An expansion on one of the main
points Rudl makes in the book. Short, but worth listening to.
Good stuff.
The coupons are good for 30 minutes each of personal consultation
with Rudl. Must be booked two weeks in advance.
Now for the main section. The books.
First, I was not impressed by the fact that Mr Rudl is a spammer.
He admits this very early in the book. (First hint: Page 3) He
seems to think that this is a legitimate way to do business.
As this is a review, rather than an editorial, I shan't go off
into one of my anti-spam rants here. Suffice to say that spamming
is NOT a legitimate way to do business. It shifts the costs of
advertising onto the recipient, whether the recipient is willing
to pay those costs or not. Forcing people to part with money
without their permission and often against their will is NOT a
civilised way to market a product or service.
The book is laid out in a useful fashion, with pages printed on
one side only, and with a wide margin for notes on the printed
side. While this might seem like just another way to increase the
perceived value, it serves a very real purpose. Keeping ideas
organised as they come to you. I ended up with about 30 pages of
notes in those spaces, mostly in "shorthand", after the first
reading. (Rudl emphasizes the purpose of the space several
times.)
The blank space is quite useful. It's unlikely to stay blank.
In general, the writing style is practical. Not flashy, which is
good. "How-To" material should be readable and clear, and this is
both. Rudl mentions in his advertising that you will need to know
how to use your email program and browser to make use of the
techniques. He's right. But you really don't need any more than
that. It's all laid out quite simply.
He gets an 'A' for clarity.
The Table of Contents:
1. Overview - Concepts to Understand (Pg 1)
2. Your Website - The Key to Success (Pg 22)
3. The Sales Process - Creating Killer Copy (Pg 112)
4. The Power of Email (Pg 132)
5. The Right Way to Use Autoresponders (Pg 189)
6. Bulk Email Works - With the Right Secrets (Pg 223)
7. Newsletters - The Underestimated Marketing Tool (Pg 276)
8. Online Services, Internet Classified Ads (Pg 295)
9. Marketing to Newsgroups (Usenet) (Pg 322)
10. Press Releases - Free Publicity (Pg 343)
11. Competitive Intelligence - Spying on Your Competitors (Pg 348)
12. Search Engine Secrets (Pg 356)
13. Miscellaneous Tips for Making and Saving Money (Pg 393)
14. Who is Buying on the Internet (Pg 415)
15. The Importance of "Backend" and Upsell Products (Pg 418)
16. The Hottest Products and Services (Pg 440)
17. If You Do Not Have a Product or Service, Joint Venture (Pg 459)
Final Notes (Pg 488)
The overview gives a good explanation of the method in which the
book was laid out, for purposes of getting the most from the
material. It also goes into some length on the importance of
planning the process from the beginning, and the need for
automating wherever possible.
Essentially, the secret is to automate wherever possible. Spend
time with things you enjoy. Or spend it marketing instead of
handling little details.
The overview also goes into several business models available on
the net, and explains why he thinks that selling your own product
is the best of them.
The thing that struck me the most in this section is simply that
Rudl doesn't make any bones about the fact that initially, no
matter how good your system is, you're going to have to work hard
to make it a success. It's surprisingly free of the usual "Make a
million dollars overnight" thinking that seems to be the rage
these days.
He does go into ways to start to generate cash flow fairly
quickly. Within a week or so, appears to be the rule.
All in all, a good outline of how to plan an online business.
Chapter Two: Your Website
-------------------------
Rudl does a good job of covering the bases here, including some
that are usually ignored or glossed over by most authors on the
subject. He gets into the details of what makes for a successful
commercial site, and hits some unorthodox notes that ring true
for me.
He covers the process of preparing a site for automation from the
beginning, and provides specific resources for making it happen.
Also how to design your own site, saving a lot of money over the
folks that will charge $5000 or more for a basic site.
Rudl also follows his own advice. This chapter seems to be where
he starts recommending services for which he gets a commission.
Not a criticism, to be sure. If the services are good, he
deserves a commission for creating new clients.
He then goes into some points regarding the use of copy and sales
tips. As an old salesman, I can tell you that these will be
effective, if used properly. Very likely the most useful of them
is his way to get people to read your copy with an open mind.
Simple, not at all deceptive, and quite effective.
The information on developing a linking strategy is worth
spending time with. Some well conceived points in that area.
The banner ad pointers seem to be quite in line with the normal
concepts. I'm not well enough informed on banner advertising to
render an informed opinion on that area, frankly.
There are some concepts here, such as the lifetime value of a
link, that I haven't seen expressed anywhere else. And some
interesting resources.
All in all, quite useful.
Chapter Three: Creating Killer Copy.
------------------------------------
Some more good points. If you have a background in copy writing,
most of this will be real familiar. If not, it's a good primer.
Some *really* good examples throughout the chapter. The one he
ends with is the best:
"It is like two men with backpacks hitching a ride on the side of
the highway. One holds a sign that says "Dallas", and the other
one holds a sign that says "To Mom's for Christmas". Guess which
one gets a ride?"
Chapter Four: The Power of Email
--------------------------------
Starts off with the basics. Good coverage of signature files,
formatting for readability, and basic email handling. Doesn't get
into filtering, which should be covered, but does a good job with
the rest of the real basics.
Where this chapter shines is in the examples of preparing and
using "canned" response letters to save time. MANY examples of
these are given, along with the best way to store them if you're
using Eudora.
(For those who use Pegasus, check the "glossary" feature.
It's under Tools | Glossary. Same thing, just a lot faster.
Info is included in the help file on using this.)
Rudl also gets into some very good points on tracking orders and
using a software package called Mailloop. I've looked at the
demo, and it appears to be a truly powerful piece of software.
Unfortunate amount of features that are only useful to spammers,
but still, extremely useful looking no matter what online
business you're in.
Chapter Five: The Right Way to Use Autoresponders
-------------------------------------------------
For me, this was the most useful and interesting chapter in the
whole set.
Rudl starts by explaining what an autoresponder is and his ideas
of what constitutes a good one. Then he covers the right ways to
do followup, including having your autoresponders do it for you.
Fits in nicely with the automation theme.
Some of the ideas in this chapter are pure dynamite, and they're
really *simple* to implement. Very creative material here,
especially the ideas on lead generation.
One word of caution that he doesn't mention: Keep the original
requests! They're your proof that the person originally asked for
the information in case they forget and accuse you of spamming
them!
Chapter Six: Bulk Email Works - With the Right Secrets
------------------------------------------------------
I have some real problems with parts of this chapter.
First, Rudl mixes all the various forms of bulk email, both legit
and not so legit. He advocates spamming, and even teaches what he
says are safe ways to do it. Yes, he includes the proper warnings
that you can be caught no matter which program you use. In my
opinion, he understates the potential for getting nabbed.
He warns against skimming addresses from newsgroups, because
those folks get hit so often that they've become hostile about
it. Then he says that one of the best ways to get addresses is to
sign up for discussion lists and grab the addresses from them.
How long does he think that it will be before the people on those
lists get hostile? And does he think that the listowner is going
to put up with it? Listowners are not among the least literate
Internet users, and many of them already seed their lists with
addresses to trap people doing just this sort of thing.
If you are tempted to follow his advice in this area, be warned.
You're treading on very thin ice. If all of the hundreds or
thousands of members of a discussion list start to complain to
your ISP, you're going to have problems. If they start
complaining to people on other lists about you, things could get
ugly real fast. Not mentioning the loss of credibility for your
business in every group that they complain to. Considering the
overlap in many of these groups of lists, that could kill a very
substantial chunk of your market REAL FAST.
Yep, you might get away with it for a good long time, if people
haven't caught on to the trick yet. They will, and when they do,
it'll catch up with you hard.
There's also the idea that discussion lists are *private
property*. There are extremely serious ethical considerations and
some potential legal problems with this sort of behavior.
As a side note, Mr Rudl points out that failing to have your
email address on your web pages is a Bad Thing. He also advocates
skimming websites for addresses. If people don't want spam, he's
forcing them to choose between being hit with junk email or
leaving their addresses off their sites.
Curious. It's bad, but he's directly helping to cause the need
for it. Hmmm...
Several other things mentioned here which you'd do well to stay
away from. Rudl makes the points that are risky pretty clear.
Now, this might sound harsh, but I can assure you that a
reputation for spamming is not in your best interests long term.
Especially with the current crop of rules and regs that are being
considered. It might just get you hit with some serious fines.
Proceed at your own risk.
There is a very substantial amount of the info in this section
that applies equally well to non-spam email marketing. Handling
flames (you'll get them no matter how clean you are), writing
copy for effective email ads, followup, and some sources for
*opt-in* bulk email lists.
You can make a lot of money using these same ideas (well, most of
them) without needing to spam. There's some really useful stuff
in this chapter. Especially the copy writing sections. Right on
the nose with that. (Some of them are deceptive, but they're
marked as such. More stuff to avoid.)
Again, a lot of the lesson centers around Mailloop and it's
capabilities. Most of these can be had through various other
programs while you're starting.
One really interesting thing to be noticed here. Rudl is very
clear that he doesn't believe in relaying off other people's
servers besides the ones you pay to use. He also suggests using
your real address and *800 number* in your ads. The entire book
pays close attention to proper customer service, and making sure
the customer gets good value for their money.
I am completely baffled as to how that can be reconciled with
spamming.
Stone kornfewzedd.
Chapter Seven: Newsletters - The Underestimated Marketing Tool
--------------------------------------------------------------
Good explanation of why it's a good idea to have your own
newsletter. He explains how to use Mailloop to create and send
these, as well as mentioning the other options. (Your own mailer,
listservers, etc.)
Some excellent points on content development. The main one he
makes is the most often overlooked. Keep it useful and clear, not
fancy.
Some of the ideas on marketing the newsletter for both
subscribers and advertisers are first rate creative stuff. It
would have been nice to see a list of links on one of those disks
for places to promote a newsletter. Maybe in the next edition.
If you're not familiar with this type of advertising, it's a good
primer. Terry Williams' book on the subject goes into much more
depth on this topic. Recommended for those who want an really
good base for newsletter/ezine advertising.
http://www.intersuccess.com/books/d141.htm
Chapter Eight: Online Services, Internet Classified Ads
-------------------------------------------------------
This chapter doesn't really have any surprises, but it is good
information for those who plan to use classified advertising
outside of newsletters.
Covers placing and tracking ads nicely. Also gets heavily into
the use of articles (with appropriate author's credits) as lead
ins for an ad, or as lead generators.
Rudl covers response times and tracking in a clearer way than is
usually done. A very large part of this can be profitably applied
offline as well.
Most of this chapter is standard, if somewhat more thorough than
the norm. The parts on designing ads have some good pointers.
Again, not much truly new, but all solid. The ideas on getting
regular information products distributed via CD Rom without
spending any money of your own are quite useful.
Chapter Nine: Marketing to Newsgroups (Usenet)
----------------------------------------------
Note: As a newsgroup moderator, this section is a bit less easy
to cover objectively than most. Just an FYI. (More grains of
salt...)
This chapter has a LOT of good advice. And some sneaky stuff that
is really not a good idea to pursue. Rudl clearly mentions which
are the sneaky tricks. Take him at his word on those. Get caught
trying them and you'll get worse than flamed. Usenetters are
every bit as protective of their forums as he says they are.
The advice on taking the participation route is right on the
money, so to speak. You can do well in newsgroups as long as you
keep a few things in mind.
1. It's NOT an overnight fortune. Be prepared to work at it
for a few months.
2. Stay focused, and let your expertise and your sig
do the selling.
3. Choose your groups carefully. Stay on topic.
Also covers some good ways to use advertising in those newsgroups
which do allow for it. Some VERY creative and simple tricks for
that. His "Seven Ways to Promote on Newsgroups" and his pointers
on proper writing for them are more than worth the time needed to
read this chapter carefully.
Rudl gives advice on ways around the cancelbots. Don't count on
it. That part is getting outdated faster every week. Always
happens when the tech wars get started. You roll the dice, you
take your chances.
Chapter Ten: Press Releases - Free Publicity
--------------------------------------------
Very short chapter (4 pages), with a lot of good links to useful
resources. The main points are all covered at the linked sites. A
few points in the book that are different enough from the
standard that they're worth looking into.
Chapter Eleven: Competitive Intelligence - Spying on Your Competitors
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Phew. This is a useful chapter, to be sure.
Keeping tabs on your competition is a practice as old as
business. This is all quite clear, quite ethical, and quite
powerful stuff.
The emphasis on using this data to improve customer service is
worth the price of entry alone. Rudl also goes into ways to find
out how much your competition is spending on banner advertising,
what is being said about them (and you) in public places online,
what names or addresses they might be using to spy on YOU, and
quite a bit more.
He also points out ways to use the same tools to find
opportunities to help potential customers, answer questions, and
generally keep a clear grip on what's happening regarding your
company and your industry. Included are URLs for free and paid
services and software for this sort of tracking.
Some very good ideas here. Some of these tools can be adapted to
a lot of different and complementary uses.
Curiously, the last half page of this chapter reads almost
*exactly* like part of an article written by another online
marketer. And it covers the concept of modelling your competitors
...
Don't model them *too* close, folks... <G>
Chapter Twelve: Search Engine Secrets
-------------------------------------
Hmm. Everyone has search engine secrets these days. Very few of
them are really secrets. Most are dangerous.
This is an area of the course that surprised me. Not too many of
the "iffy" tricks are even mentioned, except to warn you not to
do them. Instead, this is a really good foundation for planning
and implementing a search engine strategy.
It's very realistic. Rudl points out (in no uncertain terms) the
uselessness of the vast majority of the search engines (after the
top 10 or so), and the self-serving nature of most "Cool Site of
the Day" awards. (True of most online awards of any kind...)
One of the more useful tips in the chapter is the proper way to
find out what keywords your target market is using to search the
engines. Straight from the engines, no less.
Overall, this is good material. He does get into descriptions of
how the major engines and directories determine "relevancy", but
that changes so rapidly lately that some of the info will be
dated by the time it hits the printer. Still, most of this will
stay useful as long as search engines use words to determine
relevancy at all.
Chapter Thirteen: Miscellaneous Tips for Making and Saving Money
----------------------------------------------------------------
Miscellaneous is right. This chapter has no real theme, except
money. Some good tips here. Covers the spectrum.
Chapter Fourteen: Who is Buying on the Internet?
------------------------------------------------
Last year's demographics. Still a generally good profile of the
majority of Internet users. Useful if you know how to match a
product to a profile.
This chapter does contain a few good pointers on how to
select/research a product for the specific market.
Chapter Fifteen: The Importance of "Backend" and Upsell Products
----------------------------------------------------------------
A very big chunk of this course covers the importance of
understanding the lifetime value of a customer, and the
opportunities for upsell, backend, and referral products. Rudl
demonstrates his seriousness about this by packing the book with
referrals. Mind you, he also stresses the importance of making
sure the product referred is good, since it's your credibility
that's on the line.
In this chapter he gets into ways to figure the REAL long term
value of a customer and techniques to increase that value, and
the customer base itself. He again emphasizes the need to develop
*your own* products for the back end sales.
The ideas and examples for upselling are really useful material,
but fairly well known to experienced salespeople and retailers.
The useful, and sometimes very original, ideas for HOW he
approaches the upsell are quite good.
Chapter Sixteen: The Hottest Products and Services
--------------------------------------------------
This chapter doesn't just pound the old theme about information
products. It goes into an explanation of how to decide whether to
provide products or services, and how to find the market *before*
you develop a product.
Some solid techniques for this are included. This chapter is
reminiscent of Bill Myers at his finest. Real hands on "How to"
stuff. The research techniques alone can pretty much guarantee
that you'll have a viable, marketable product before you start
development.
Also takes a short but realistic look at the question of network
marketing online. Some points to consider for the MLMers in the
crowd.
Chapter Seventeen: If You Do Not Have a Product or Service, Joint Venture
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Some pretty creative ideas in this chapter. Ways to start making
money without a product of your own. While reading it, a couple
ideas occurred to me for some interesting hybrids.
Note that this concept does not only apply to online business.
Not by a long stretch. In fact, this is the subject of the
cassette that came with the package, and it used 100% offline
examples.
Included is a roughly 20 page contract for joint ventures, and
some good advice on making sure that you get paid.
I'd be surprised if you didn't have at least three workable ideas
for joint ventures within twenty minutes after reading this, if
you applied the ideas.
Overall judgment? It's easily the best book (course) on doing
business online that's available right now. If he'd left out the
spamming stuff I'd be happier about it, but even without those
ideas there's a real wealth of solid, useful info here.
Should you buy it? That's a different issue.
If you've bought a lot of books in the past, and didn't follow
through and use the info in them, no. You'd be wasting $200. You
won't use the ideas in this one either. It's not a "magic
bullet".
If you're really desperate for immediate cash, and don't have
both a product in hand and the ability to follow instructions
*right now*, no. Do some extra jobs to get the money you need.
It's also not a lottery ticket.
If you're dabbling in online business and want to see what you
might be able to do with it, and you're serious enough to do what
it takes to find out, then yes, it's probably a good investment
for you. The guarantee is solid. If you don't triple your online
income in 90 days, you send it back and get another $197 extra
for trying it out seriously.
If you're serious about business and making money online - yeah.
Get the book. And pay real close attention to how Rudl uses the
principles he teaches, even in the course itself. Those examples
are the best lessons in the course.
The time this book will save you in research and testing is worth
the price all by itself.
You can check out the information Rudl has posted on the course
at http://www.marketingtips.com/sr/t.x/4684/
Paul is the editor of TalkBiz News, a newsletter devoted to helping you
build your real world business with real world ideas. Published 3-5 times
weekly, it covers all aspects of small business, online and off. To
subscribe, send any email to newsletter@talkbiz.com.
If this huge training course is something you just would never have the time
to work through, alternatives would be: the AIS Secrets course
click here for review or if you just want a comprehensive arsenal of
marketing tips, tools and techniques you can go here for everything
you could ever possibly want. If you are just starting out, you might want
to try some FREE marketing and promotional tools first,
which you can find here.
More useful links: