OK, we all know how I feel about memes. (Although if you want to read a meme IttyBiz-style, check out Duct-Taped Breasts, Hairy Mangoes and New Kids on the Block. You know you want to.) But 90% of you are recovering from The Great Turkey Incident of 2008 and I am recovering from seeing Australia, the longest movie ever made. So we’ll slack off and just chat, huh? Totally not a meme because nobody made me do it.

(Re: Australia. Total thumbs up. I LOVED it. I would love to say it’s the best movie I’ve seen all year but there’s a good chance it’s the only movie I’ve seen all year, so that’s not the best endorsement I can give. But yeah, awesome.)

First up, we’re having a sorta sale — Online Business School buyers can get consulting for crazy stupid cheap. Go here for details, because there’s not-so-fine print. (You’ll find it under the ingenious heading, “The Not-So-Fine Print”.) And yes, it also applies to those of you who already bought.

Yesterday, when this went out to my advance discount list (you ARE on that list, aren’t you?) there were fifty. There are no longer fifty but that’s all I’m saying to avoid the Filthy Marketing Whore scarcity tactics thing that we’ve already talked to death.

And yeah, the price on OBS is going to double soon and no, I don’t know how soon because I can’t predict the future and Seth Godin might decide to become an affiliate tomorrow and sell fifty million copies in half an hour. You just can’t know. Probably next week, so you might want to get off your ass on this one. (If you don’t want the consulting deal because you’re afraid of the phone or commitment or whatever, you can just get the course at the normal Online Business School page.)

On that topic, if you go to the same page as my sorta sale, you’ll find Dave Navarro is giving away 30 Hours A Day for $77 which is totally insane and retarded. (Note regular price of $147. Sale-hating-Havi is probably knee deep in deep breathing right now just to handle the stress.) There’s, like, nine left or something at the time of this writing.

Next up, writing ebooks. The very lovely Tina McAllister has done what the rest of us have been telling ourselves to do for months — she’s specializing. She’s a freelance writer and she really likes ghost-writing ebooks. So she said to herself, “Tina, you know what you should do? GHOST WRITE EBOOKS!” So she is. She’s got some contest going on or something where you can win a free custom book, but that’s not really what I’m interested in. (Although if you are broke or cheap, you may very well be interested.)

What I’m interested in is the fact that she doesn’t suck. Now, I can’t have my books ghost-written because nobody drops the f-bomb quite like I do and readers would know something was amiss. But from what I’ve seen, Tina doesn’t suck. And if I were to get a book ghost-written, she would be my go-to chick.

What I’m ALSO interested in is that Tina got off her ass and said, this is what I’m doing. This is a gutsy and vital thing to do. If you want to make any real money in freelancing, do what she’s done. (Well, not ghost-writing. She’s got that well in hand. Specializing.)

Speaking of books, I’m reading two and you should be, too. The new Malcolm Gladwell (of Tipping Point and Blink fame) is looking like it’s going to be killer. It’s called The Outliers. Very cool. And The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less
has me literally gasping. Wicked.

Moving on to Charlie. Now, I want to be Charlie when I grow up but that would involve a lot of lifestyle changes I’m not particularly willing to make. (I have a feeling I’m not going to be allowed in to the US National Guard, and I’m a long way off from getting my Ph.D., for example.) While the rest of the blogosphere is running top ten lists, Charlie is, you know, using the brain the good Lord gave him. However, if I linked to as many of Charlie’s posts as I wanted to, IttyBiz would become The Charlie Show, so I don’t. BUT.

This post was fucking killer. I won’t go into too much about what it’s about, but it really touched a nerve with something I’ve been having a hard time with lately.

Eco-friendly practices have become the new black. Being green is dead sexy. But it’s hard to be as green as we want to be when we know we’re flawed and it feels like any of our attempts at helping are a drop in the bucket when held up against our many, many failures. Charlie sheds some very interesting and thought-provoking light on this. Go read it.

Last up, speaking of top ten lists, have I ever linked to this video before? I don’t remember, but I remember that it’s awesome. That’ll make you feel better about the turtle situation.

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 28, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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(This is a guest post from Conrad Hees who writes about self-marketing, among other things, at ConradHees.com. He realized that I was moving across the Atlantic and that might make me a little busy, so he very nicely offered to pitch in. Not a bad little self-marketing effort, come to think of it.)

As marketers, our main job is to connect in an effective way with clients/customers who are in need of our product or service, and elicit a desired result from them. This can sometimes be difficult, and other times it is easier. But one surefire way to fail at marketing is to chase after and/or try to convert people who just don’t get it.

Many of us feel like if we are passionate enough about our product or service and a good enough salesperson, we will be able to convert potential customers who really need what we have to offer, but just don’t realize it themselves yet. While you may sometimes be able to convert an ill-informed or ill-motivated potential customer, most of the time you can’t, and it will take too much time and effort to do so, making it an effort in futility.

In this article, I will illustrate exactly why you cannot waste your time trying to market to those who just don’t get it.

Case in point:

I have recently joined a social network on Ning, a site that allows people to create their own social networks centered around a topic, such as blogging or Shania Twain fans or Republicans who live in Kentucky or whatever.

The name of the network that I am a part of is called the 20 Something Bloggers, and it has over 3.000 members. I would estimate that the composition of the people on the site is made up of about 75% diary bloggers who write on a free service such as Blogger.com, another 15% who have diary blogs on their own self-hosted site, and the remaining 10% is made up of bloggers who write about focused topics on either their own site or a free one.

My purpose in joining this community is to try to reach the 100-300 (and growing) bloggers who write well about a focused topic on a free Blogger or Wordpress.com blog, and who are interested in having me setup a self-hosted Wordpress blog for them (for a commission of course). I hope to create a nice little side income with this approach.

My problem with accomplishing this is that I did not anticipate that many of my target customers just don’t get it.

Having your own self-hosted blog is much more powerful than blogging on a free blogging service, simply because people take you much more seriously and that you own your own blog, among other reasons.

I know the powerful benefits of owning your own self-hosted blog, and I assumed that many of the bloggers on this network would be very interested in making the switch to self-hosting, but perhaps were just procrastinating because of technical reasons or what-have-you. It became apparent to me very quickly that most of these bloggers, even if they were interested in getting self-hosted, were holding back from taking the plunge due to several factors:

1) They do not realize the power of self-hosting over ‘free-blogging’, and even when it is explained in great detail to them, they are unreceptive and resistant to the concept of actually owning their own blog, rather than spending 5-10 hours per week or more blogging for a site which they do not own.

2) They do not realize exactly how much time, effort, and energy they are wasting blogging for a free service. They do not see that people never take a ‘free’ blogger quite as seriously as a self-hosted blogger.

(Worse, many actually claim that they cannot afford $7-$10 per month to get a self-hosted blog, which they spend hours on each day, yet will spend $7 on a sandwich without blinking an eye.)

3) They simply are not motivated to advance their careers or put more money in their pocket like others are. Even if they are ‘authority blogging’, they do not want to get self-hosted because they just don’t care about how they are being perceived. They write for themselves.

My point in all this is that I quickly realized that these people are not my target market — not because they don’t need what I have to offer, but rather because they just don’t get it.

And it’s useless to try to reach and convert people who don’t get it.

Permission Marketing and Converting the Non-Believers

Don’t bother trying to convert those who don’t get it. Why not, you ask?

1. Because if they haven’t gotten it by now, there is probably a very good reason why.

2. The ones who don’t get it are, more often than not, unwilling to see a different way of thinking. They don’t want to see your point of view or hear your pitch, even if you really are trying to help them.

3. These people take literally 5-10X the amount of normal effort that you usually put out to get a sale. It’s not worth it.

4. You will drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to prove your point to a person who doesn’t want to hear it, or worse, will not admit you are right or have what they need, even if they finally do ‘get it’.

Besides, there are too many people out there who do get it. Although it may not seem like it, for every person out there who needs what you are marketing but doesn’t know it or get it, there is someone who totally gets it and is ready and waiting for you to sell it to them.

Permission marketing is a term coined by Seth Godin (who else?) that is used to describe the new wave of marketing that goes against the grain of the old, throw-it-against-the-wall-and-see-if-it-sticks way of marketing to the masses.

Permission marketing is when you market and pursue people who actually want what you are selling to them. It is when you have permission by the person to sell to them, and they welcome your marketing.

TV advertising is old-fashioned, where you show an ad to 5 million people, and 4.9 million do not want what you are selling, and don’t want to see your ad.

Pay-Per-Click advertising is permission marketing because you are putting your ad in front of people who want to see it. They are looking for what you have to sell, and they don’t mind being sold to.

These are the type of customers we are looking for. People who don’t need a lot of chasing after or convincing. People who f***ing get it. (Editor’s Note: He’s a guest poster and his mom is probably reading this, so we left the little stars in. Hi, Conrad’s Mom!!)

Final Thoughts on Marketing to Those Who Get It

In our businesses, we need clients and customers who get it. The type of people who see exactly what we are trying to do for them, who see the value in our services and products, and who understand that a true, valuable professional who can add real value to their lives is going to cost more than $18/hour.

Most importantly, we need people who understand what an investment is. Who will spend $500 now because they know it will make them $25,000 down the line.

We can find these types of customers who really get it by doing a few simple things:

- Going to the places where people who get it may be meeting and hanging out

- Making a decision very shortly about whether they get it or don’t get it so as to avoid wasting time as much as possible

- Seeking out customers who have a history of trying new things and being intelligent, and also those who understand an investment.

- Cutting the fat from our list of leads to make contact with. Anyone who has not been sold after the first several contacts may just be a tough shell to crack, they just might not get it. If you suspect they are the latter, axe them from your list.

- Creating enough of a reputation for ourselves and our businesses that the people who ‘get it’ simply come to us, all by themselves. This, of course, is the hardest and longest way to get good customers, and yet the easiest and best way once you reach a certain level. Naomi knows all about this.

So, now that I’ve brought it up, are you marketing to people who don’t get it? It’s a question we all should ask ourselves periodically, or we run the risk of not getting ‘it’ either.

The money, that is. :)

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 26, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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Tomorrow, there will be a very well reasoned guest post on this blog, discussing something important and topical and intelligent. Today, you get me screaming, “WHAT THE FUCK?” So much so that I’m opening up comments because I am DESPERATE to hear if somebody, ANYBODY, has an intelligent answer to this question.

What is the point of this?

Let’s say I go to your website. And you have a flash intro. And the flash intro gives me no information whatsoever. It’s just, you know, some pictures fading in and out. And then you have an option that says I can “Skip Intro”. WHY WOULD I WANT TO DO ANYTHING OTHER THAN SKIP THE FUCKING INTRO?

This also applies to “Enter Site”. I get there, there’s a picture (because the cheap-ass site owner didn’t spring for a sexy flash intro) with a button beside it that says “Enter Site”. WHY WOULD I HAVE COME HERE IF I DIDN’T WANT TO ENTER THE FUCKING SITE?

Now, I admit I may not know something here and my total screaming caps-lock-bolded-text fury may be really stupid. (If you have been reading this blog for any length of time, you’ll know I do not make these types of admissions easily.) But seriously. WHY?

***

And now for a couple of completely off-topic snapshots into my brain:

1. The sound of Toby Keith singing Christmas hymns totally makes me want to go have sex. (Luckily my husband could be mistaken for Toby Keith in any bar in America, which eliminates any possibility for unpleasantness involving tequila, a cowboy hat and a stranger.)

Who knew that Go Tell It On The Mountain would make you want find the nearest cowboy and whisper, “I’ll wash all YOUR sins away, baby”.

This is obviously disgustingly wrong. Generally speaking, things that are THAT wrong have marketing lessons in them. I’m clearly too distracted right now to think of what the associated lesson here is, but you’re bright people. You can figure it out. Let me know if you come up with anything.

(EDIT: It has come to my attention that when I ran this post, I said “The sound of Toby Keith signing Christmas hymns…” Somehow, that’s even weirder than what I meant, which was pretty damn weird in the first place.)

2. Somebody returned Online Business School because there wasn’t enough swearing in it. (This is probably the same person who returned SEO School because it had too much swearing in it.)

Am I joking? I am SO not joking. You can’t make this shit up, people.

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 25, 2008 in Small Business Marketing - 79 Comments
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First of all, in a delightful homage to something — irony, maybe? — I’d like to let you know that according to Alexa, this website gets no traffic. Nope, not even from you. (Alexa is a website traffic ranking website that compares your traffic to other sites.) Back when this site was getting 15,000 hits a week, it was about the 60,000th most popular site on the internet.

Now that it’s getting 100,000 hits a week, it is the 357,930th most popular site on the internet. Isn’t that nice? I think that’s nice.

Thank you, Alexa, for being slightly more unreliable than the Bush administration. Continue Reading …

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 17, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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You know that big massive behemoth of a project I’ve been working on? The thing that’s turned my posting frequency here to something similar to National Geographic? Yeah, it’s done.

You know whether you want this or not, so I’m not even going to go there with the selling. But.

The first 2000 copies are going for half price.

Why? Because I’m nice. And because I’m moving to England and everything costs double in England. And because I’m nice.

If you were around for the SEO School debacle, you know what’s about to happen. Over the next several hours, some very big name marketers, ones in the business of squeezing every last dollar out of their readers, are going to be sending a shitload of people here. It’s going to be nuts because it was nuts last time and last time nobody had ever heard of IttyBiz.

I would much rather give the half price copies to my own readers, so if you plan to buy it, buy it now.

If you don’t plan to buy it, I promise this blog will be back to normal tomorrow.

Also, I got an Ask IttyBiz question the other day about the impact of guarantees on conversion rates. Yes, a 100% guarantee is good, but it has become the standard. It’s not exceptional anymore.

If you want to see a guarantee that increases conversion rates, check this one out. It’s near the bottom.

By Naomi Dunford - Nov 12, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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So I got hit by a car and it screwed me up for a week. Now my family knows I’m not dead I can tell you guys. But that’s why I disappeared. I know there are those among you who are blogging from the ER but I am just not that dedicated.

Anyway, we like doing cool stuff for the holidays here at IttyBiz. If you were around last year, you’ll remember the trainwreck that was the holiday manifesto. Yeah, we’re not doing THAT again. (I still haven’t got that damn check, by the way.)

Instead, I was thinking that since y’all have IttyBiz’s and a lot of you sell consumer goods, I figured we’d do a gift guide. Everybody’s shopping for that holiday at the end of the year anyway, you may as well buy from cool people in the IttyBiz tribe instead of giving all your money to Wal-Mart. Cool, huh?

Want in? Here’s what you do.

Email Jamie at jamie@ittybiz.com telling him what you sell and why it’s cool. Do this before November 15th. Include your URL. Put “GIFT GUIDE” in the subject line. Do not expect a response ’cause the poor bastard is going to get SLAMMED.

When I was running this by my ill-focused focus group, three people asked where they should send their swag stuff. YOU DO NOT HAVE TO SEND ME SWAG STUFF!!!

But I figure that I can avoid a bunch of emails from people saying, “Where do I send the swag stuff?” by just putting the address on the internet. (Sorry Mom. But seriously, chill out. I’m listed, for God’s sake. They’d find me anyway.)

Any stuff you send, unless it’s custom, will be donated to the Rotholme Women’s Shelter because I spent a Christmas there once when Michael was little and they were really, really nice to us and Santa came and everything. We heart giving back and all that charitable shit.

The Very Short List of Rules

Don’t apply if you don’t sell stuff that would make good Christmas presents TO A NORMAL PERSON. Yes, we all know SEO School would make a fantastic present, but stuff like that is not making the list. My mother is co-ordinating this. (Sorry Mom. Yes, again.) If my beige-loving mother doesn’t think this would be at least a marginally reasonable Christmas gift, it’s not going on the list.

Don’t apply if you don’t ship internationally. Even if you bend people over on shipping charges, that’s fine. We’re used to it. But we have Australian readers and Japanese readers and Ukrainian readers and, um, CANADIAN readers and we have NO TIME for people who only ship domestically.

Don’t apply if your order-by date is before December 1st. I know this kicks a lot of people out, but we need to give the peeps a chance and I don’t want to deal with the angry emails from people who are like, “This person won’t let me buy!” We’re trying to do READERS a favor and some readers shop late and their money is just as good as the keeners who bought in July.

Tell your friends! If you don’t do consumer goods but your Aunt Mavis does, tell her. Tell your forum friends. Tell your mom. Whatever.

If you want to send stuff, send it to this address, care of my husband. This is because the post office guy thinks I’m a Nazi lesbian man-hater and doesn’t give me my packages simply because he hates me.

James Dunford
1-123 Wortley Road
London, Ontario, Canada
N6C 3P3

Get your applications in by November 15th and no, there are no exceptions and no, I don’t care if you were a missionary in Africa and had no access to the internet. I don’t care. But good for you for feeding the orphans anyway.

By Naomi Dunford - Oct 31, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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While I can’t speak for everybody, I can speak for myself. And in my little world, product launch time makes me really stupid. Not like, stupid stupid. Just that I don’t have a lot of brain cells left at the end of the day. (Case in point: I just wrote that sentence as “I don’t have a lot of brain cells at the left of the day.” As opposed to at the right of the day?)

But when you’re taking on a project as big as this one, with preorders and affiliates and launch videos and a bunch of yummy free content to whip people into a froth of excitement, well, you’ve got a lot on your plate. You don’t have a lot of time to think up witty and insightful blog posts.

(Speaking of which, and I’m not going to say this again, fewer than 10% of the people who read this blog are on my advance discount list. Based on history, about 25% of the people who read this blog are going to join Online Business School.

This means there are currently about a thousand people who are going to pay 4 times what they have to because they haven’t got around to signing up for the list.

If you’re among the 75% who will never join, no problem and don’t worry, we’re never going to talk about this again. If you’re one of the 25%, for God’s sake, get on the fucking list. I’m handing you $300 here. Seriously, enter your email address, click the link in the email you get and just check out the knock-your-fansocks-off guarantee. Unsubscribe five minutes later if you want to, but at least check it out. You’re going to be really pissed at yourself later if you don’t.)

Moving on to my inability to write a coherent blog post. Here are some things that have blown my mind in the last couple of days:

John Unger is an absolute genius. We’re currently working on one of the coolest marketing projects I’ve ever been involved with. When he sent me the background info for his project, he sent me a link to the three best things that have ever happened to his business. It’s awesome. It’s what I’ve been trying to explain to people for years. It’s a beautifully and personally explained version of what I scream about when I am invited to dinner parties. (Note: never invite me to a dinner party.)

A while back I wrote a post called How We Killed Social Media, and some comedian submitted it to Digg. (It made the front page before the Diggerati had a shit fit and buried it so far it made my head hurt.) But it still gets a lot of traffic because anything that makes the front page does. I got a comment there from a new reader (hi, new readers!) that I wanted to share with you. It’s from Sarah Browne, from Guru of New:

“It’s all Me Media now. All me, all the time. Everybody is so busy self-promoting that social media is no fun anymore. I remember those dinosaur digital days when connecting was called ‘community’ and it was genuinely about community — not just a log of ‘look at me!’ one-liners. Even the mantra: *share, not sell * has simply turned into people *pretending* to share so they can sell some DVD or ebook. The shameless self-promotion can only get worse as our economy gets worse. Kvetch kvetch. Can connecting online be fun again? Pretty please?”

Well said, dude.

And speaking of social media, are you following me on Twitter yet? I’m a lot better on Twitter these days because I only have to come up with 140 characters. Lucky followers yesterday were treated to this piece of delightfulness.

By Naomi Dunford - Oct 24, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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Around this time last year, I started this blog in earnest. I had done a few posts prior to October, but I managed to get my hands on a boatload of traffic and asked them what they wanted in a small business and marketing blog. Because they were nice, they told me.

Here’s what they came up with:

Time Management for Small Business Owners

What To Do When You Don’t Know What To Do is for when you’re sitting there looking and your to-do list and it makes you want to turn around and go back to bed.

How To Get Four More Hours In Your Day is for, well, you know.

How To Pull An All Nighter is for when you’re about to launch a product and you are going to email every major player in your industry and there’s a very good chance you’re not going to get it done EVER and you’ll die hungry and alone. (Not that I know ANYTHING about that.)

How To Avoid Burnout is something I should probably get off my ass and reread instead of just sending you there.

What Do You Have To Give is about giving generously even when you feel you have nothing left.

Money and Small Business

Having a Backup Plan That Doesn’t Suck is a guide for figuring out what makes a good backup plan and what, um, doesn’t.

Creating Multiple Income Streams gets into the idea of what income streams really are and figuring out where they all fall on the passive, semi-passive, and active spectrum.

Finding the right risk balance is one of my favorites because it uses the words “riskophile” and “riskophobe”, both of which are pretty awesome.

Money and Entrepreneurship: Best of the Web is where I bail and just regurgitate other people’s advice.

Can You Afford It? tells you how to stop lying to yourself about your financial decisions.

Small Business Marketing

What Are You Really Selling? puts every purchase into one of two categories: love, and money.

9 Steps To Rockstar Marketing is one of my favorite posts, and it talks about marketing to people while they’re buying laxatives.

Should You Sell On Price? is one I talked about yesterday but it’s in the series so I’m putting it here too.

Small Business Psychology

Conspiracy Theories tells what to do when working from home is making you lose your mind. It is also the one where I say “slut” nine times in a row.

Are You Cocky or Do You Have Balls? really defies the need for commentary, doesn’t it?

What To Do When You’re Scared Shitless is from so long ago that I still used symbols instead of swearing in my title.

Thanks, early readers, for giving me something to write about during that first month when you think you’re blogging to an empty room.

By Naomi Dunford - Oct 22, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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Every day I get questions about pricing. When I did the course with the Havinator, I dominated the week four money call with a half hour rant on pricing, and I could’ve gone another six hours. I have much to say on the topic of pricing. (See pricing for service providers and should you sell on price? to get caught up.)

Anyway, so I’ve finished Online Business School and I spent a LOT of time thinking about pricing. (Speaking of price, if you’re on my advance discount list you get the option to buy it presale for 75% off. Just saying.) I haven’t seen anything really like it, so it was damn hard figuring out what to price it at. Monthly? One price? Price it based on how much money it’ll make people? Price it based on the fact that everybody’s already broke? Tough stuff.

I got in this big ass talk with Jamie and he’s looking at me all “You’re preaching to the converted, honey” and I realized I should probably blog about this.

Conceptually speaking, there are a lot of considerations that go into setting your prices. But practically, there’s really only one.

You need to know your market.

Here are some examples:

The Havinator sells change your habits stuff. It’s beautifully put together and once you own it, you know it — no need for follow up stuff. She has a bunch of products, but my favorite is her Emergency Calming Techniques. (When your entire family’s future depends on your ability to not fuck up an online business, well, you need the calming, you know?) She sets a one time payment at less than $80 because that’s what her market can afford to spend on something relatively unknown.

They have the faith from her freebies that she can solve their problems but if for some reason they hate it and she’s struck by lightning at the exact same time so she can’t issue them a refund, well, it’s not the end of the world. One time $77 for Emergency Calming Techniques? Easy. (Someday I will write a review for this. Today is not that day.)

Mark has two main products. He has the book, Unveiling the Heart of Your Business, and then he has the Heart of Business mastermind group of awesomeness (this is actually called The Business Oasis). Both are reasonably priced, but the value on the latter is KILLER. Because that’s totally fucking obvious, anyone and their mother tries to get in. But they can’t.

He’s set up the group so that only people who are on board with the Heart of Business beliefs system can get in. You gotta buy, read and dig the book before you can get into the mastermind group of awesomeness.

He has positioned it as a monthly fee, but you buy it yearly. His audience has an existing small business, and small business owners often don’t like making repeated payments. (Because there’s always the possibility we might be homeless by next Thursday.) Pay once, get it over with, and get on with the palm trees, says Mark’s people.

Then you have SimplWeb. They make websites for people who suck at making websites but need one anyway. They’re generally also targeting small business owners, but they’re really there to help the new people. New people don’t have any money. They’re also not going to MAKE any money until they have a website. Conundrum, yeah?

This is why THEY charge monthly. Twenty bucks a month anybody can do. (Well, anybody seriously planning to get a website, anyway.) A few grand to drop on a website? Probably not. Twenty bucks? No problem.

So yeah. Know your market. Don’t just know what they can afford — that’s easy.

Know how and when they like to pay.

And get on my advanced discount list so I can sell you Online Business School for less than $100 and a quarter of what the other losers are paying.

By Naomi Dunford - Oct 20, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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It has come to my attention that as a communication medium, blogging sometimes sucks rocks. Among its downfalls are the comment debacle, the fact that I can only realistically write in bite sized chunks, and the constant emails I get from people who haven’t read about something because their feed reader is full.

I’m not talking about those today, though, so ignore everything you just read. Today, I’m talking about blogging sucking for a whole different reason.

When I came out with SEO School and it got a review on Copyblogger, the number one search term that people used to find this blog was “SEO School Discount Code”. A whole bunch of people who don’t know me or love me or sympathize with me when I get a black eye were finding the good deals. While this is probably legal in most of the states in the union, I think it sucks. You guys are the ones giving me the love every day, so you guys are the ones who should get the good stuff.

Secondly, blogging lends itself to rants and passing thoughts and snippets. Little mini-lessons and such. Which is cool, but most of you don’t really need snippets. When I asked for feedback on the How To Work From Home When You Have No Fucking Talent course (which I’m still seeking, by the way) one of the big complaints y’all had was that few of the products out there are complete. It’s great that this book teaches you to use AdSense and this blog teaches you 10 Hacks For Some Shit Or Other, but you want TRAINING.

Feedback is indicating you want to know how to get out of this massive mess in which you find yourself and make some fucking money already.

Therefore, if training is what you want, training is what you’ll get. We’re hard at work at IttyBiz HQ finding the awesomest stuff for you guys. If we’re not finding it, we’re making it ourselves. We’re doing free courses like the How To Make $12,246 in a Day Stuff and paid stuff like SEO School. But we don’t want to hand it around like a tray of stale cake.

[Drumroll please...]

So we’re making a list. It’s the “Let me know when there’s free stuff” list and the “I want in before all the other losers” list and the “I’m too cool to pay retail” list.

Click here to get in.

Or don’t. Pay full price and let all your competitors kick your ass. Doesn’t matter to me.

By Naomi Dunford - Oct 15, 2008 in Small Business Marketing
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