Narrowing Down The Market
ByPhew. Just had my first 1:1 mentoring session with Ed and it was a bit hairy for the first 20 mins or so. We talked about how coaching was what I’m really interested in, rather that building an internet marketing business (although I probably didn’t state it as clearly as that) and then went about trying to identify a market.
Problem is the world is my market and people in general, However, that was never going to wash with Ed.
I could see his point.
In the traditional marketing model one of the biggest mistakes is to try and market to everyone. But choosing a market with the sole purpose of creating an IM business is not something that works for me. I’ve done that too many times in the past and resented all the time I spent writing about cholesterol, finance, pilates, swimming pool pumps (I kid you not), water purification etc. etc.
As the call went on I could feel my energy dropping as I imagined picking a market and trying to make myself enjoy the work involved.
The breakthrough in the conversation came when Ed said how good the content was on my Life Moves blog. I was surprised at his enthusiasm since I see my blog posts and my IM writing from the past as distinctly different. I was assuming that it would be the latter type that I would have to revert to if I picked a specific market.
“Could I continue to write like I do on my Life Coaching blog, and have a specific market I asked?” “Absolutely”, says Ed and then proceeded to bring up my latest blog post, on the screen, and add a few words here and there to make it useful to the real estate market, as an example.
Hmmm . . . getting better but not quite there yet.
I am interested in the mechanics of internet marketing. I like numbers and measuring them and learning new things.
But I like to write about life. The journey. The process.
These things attract me more than the goal of just making money in an online marketing business. If you told me I could make a million this year but the content I’d have to write about was something I wasn’t interested in I wouldn’t take your money. So it’s important for me that, no matter how the business side of things pans out, I am able to enjoy the process while I’m creating it.
This year, part of my journey will be an internet marketing adventure being mentored by Ed. I’d like to write about that experience and also record the actions I take and progress made. (See the Web Marketing Strategy and Results section).
I’d assumed that Ed’s response would be to say that the IM market is already saturated and too hard to get into but, to my surprise, he thought it was a great idea.
And so, this blog was born.
Actually it was conceived rather than born since some keyword seo and niche research was needed before I chose a domain name etc.
But before we move onto that let’s look at how this web marketing game differs from those I’ve played in the past. See my post regarding internal motivation.
No related posts.
Good idea – and nice of Ed to post a link to your CFT post so we can all find you!
You might as well be writing my song just in a different key.
I’ve been keeping some notes privately, not sure if I’m brave enough to publish the whole saga like you have.
Do you find it helps keep you on track, accountable or just helps you remember what you’ve agreed to do and why?
Keep us posted…
Lee
Hello Lee
Great question! I’m not sure it’s any of those things for me.
I truly do believe that whether we’re successful or not at anything we set out to do has more to do with how we transform ourselves into being the person who is successful and less about the actual tactics and strategies we follow to get there. For years this part of the process wasn’t talked about at all in the internet marketing field. I think the things I am learning about myself and how I turn up in the world as I try to turn my online “hobby” into a proper business would have to be learned no matter what arena I was playing in. Same with the skills I’m finding myself having to practice. It’s not so much about learning how to spin an article but more about learning how I approach that task, what I think about it, what stops me from achieving it etc and then making adjustments accordingly.
I’d always assumed that the internet marketing gurus had the type of personality where all this stuff – discipline, commitment and focus – came naturally. But now I’m not so sure. Ed Dale, for example, talks about how he had to learn to write well and regularly and how he still needs discipline in order to keep doing it. John Reese mentioned that he never made any money for the first couple of years when he started his internet business – that one was a total revelation to me – and Frank Kern tells how unhappy he was for a while even though he’d made pots of money.
But all those stories are in retrospect so it’s easy to look at them and think “yeah, but they didn’t have to deal with this” or “they weren’t like me in this area”. So I wanted to tell the story as I’m going through it. I want people to know that it’s a journey, that even the daftest of things can trip us up and that we always have a choice. We can continue to carry on as we always have and get the same results or we can change who we’re being and move forward.
And, finally, this is the stuff I enjoy writing about. I don’t need to be “brave” to do it. It comes naturally to me. In fact it only gets difficult when I start thinking that I should be providing more information, or caring what everyone’s thinking of me or a million and one other thoughts that can stop me posting. But, bottom line is, it’s fun for me.
There’s absolutely no need for you to publish “the whole saga” if it doesn’t feel like a fun thing to do.
Thanks for asking the question. I’ve enjoyed getting my head around my answer.
Gillian