BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL ... - …media.info-marketing.org/journal/200610_Journal.pdfinformation marketing business including a kit marketed to new customers,

October 2006Price: $197.00

BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL INFO-MARKETERS AROUND THE WORLD

How to Find the Most Profitable Info-marketing Opportunities

2INFORMATION MARKETING INSIDERS’ JOURNAL OCTOBER 2006

CHAIRMAN’S NOTE

Information MarketingAssociation

P.O. Box 14629Tallahassee, FL 32317-4629

Phone: 850/222-6000Fax: 850/222-6002

Web: www.Info-Marketing.org

EditorSusan Trainor

Info-Marketing Insiders’ Journal is published monthly by the

Information Marketing Association and delivered by mail. Subscriptions include full membership benefits in the IMA and cost just $197 monthly ($227 for international members).

Back issues are $197 each ($95 for members).Copyright © 2006

Information Marketing AssociationAll Rights Reserved

ALTHOUGH THE IMA BELIEVES THE CONTENT TO BE ACCURATE, COMPLETE AND CURRENT, THE IMA MAKES NO WARRANTY AS

TO THE ACCURACY, COMPLETENESS OR CURRENCY

OF THE CONTENT.

IT IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY TO VERIFY ANY INFORMATION

BEFORE RELYING ON IT.

NONE OF THE INFORMATION CONTAINED HEREIN SHOULD BE CONSTRUED AS LEGAL ADVICE, NOR IS ANYONE ASSOCIATED

WITH THE INFORMATION MARKETING ASSOCIATION

ENGAGED IN THE PRACTICE OF LAW. IF YOU NEED LEGAL

ADVICE, PLEASE SEEK THE ADVICE OF INDEPENDENT LEGAL

COUNSEL.

The Superman of Information Marketing

Bill Glazer, ChairmanInformation Marketing Associationwww.Info-Marketing.org

President and CEOGlazer-Kennedy Inner Circle LLCwww.DanKennedy.com

President and CEOBGS Marketing LLCwww.BGSMarketing.com

The Key to Information Marketing – Selecting Your Market

Dan Kennedy often recounts a Gary Halbert seminar where Gary said to the group, “I could operate a successful restaurant if I

only had one thing.” Then, Gary asked the partici-pants what that one thing could be.

The meeting attendees threw out guesses like a great location, the best menu or low prices. Because Gary is a great direct response copywriter, one guest said, “A great sales letter.”

In the end, Gary told them the only thing he’d need to operate a successful restaurant is “a starv-ing crowd.” If you have a group of starving people standing outside the restaurant, it’s easy to get them inside and make money. And that’s a lesson for all of us info-marketers.

The info-marketer profiles in this month’s IMA Insiders’ Journal focus on identifying profitable mar-kets. If there is one single most important factor in creating a successful info-business, selecting a profitable market is it.

• Ed O’Keefe conducted several weeks of research on 47 different niche industries before selecting the one with the most potential for him.

• Jordan McAuley took a product sold for a few dollars in the back of free newspapers and created a lucrative business by positioning the product to markets that needed the same infor-mation and had the resources to buy it.

• Brett Fogle chose his niche after identifying the customers with the most disposable income, then going out and finding an expert to create a product for them.

Each of these info-marketers carefully selected their markets and adapted their products to serve lucrative markets that had money to spend and problems to solve. These are terrific lessons to study this month, only through the IMA Insiders’ Journal.


FEATURES

Contents

Turnkey Marketing for Dentists Is Big Business

COLUMNS & DEPARTMENTS JOINT VENTURE OPPORTUNITIES28 It’s Time for You to

“Cash In” BIG On Your “Toll Booth” Position

UPCOMING EVENTS

29 IMA Calendar

PRESIDENT’S REPORT

30 Who Else Wants a Multimillion-dollar Info-

marketing Business?

7

13

Essential Metrics for Info-marketersTo make good business judgments you need a firm grasp of your numbers. You must know which ads are performing so you know how to adjust your future spending to maximize your marketing investment.

Hard Work and Research Pay OffAfter exhaustive study, Ed O’Keefe concluded that the dentistry profession offered the greatest opportunity to his business. In just a couple of years he has built an extensive information marketing business.

13

17 Building an Info-marketing Business With Joint VenturesIn less than a year, Brett Fogle created a new product and launched a million-dollar info-business. For IMA members, he reveals how he did it and the insider secrets he discovered.

21

When Copy-ing Is O.K.: The ‘Fair Use’ RuleIn some situations, you may make limited use of another’s work without asking permission.

Sooner or later, almost all writers quote or closely paraphrase what oth-ers have written. Read this article and learn the rules!

23

7

Meet an Info-marketing ‘Lifer’Jordan McAuley has been an info-marketer for a long time. Since high school, as a matter of fact. McAuley remembers, “In high school, I just wanted to make some extra money.”

It’s Never Too Early to Start a Business



One of the key reasons the Internet has succeeded as it has is, aside from getting onto it, it’s largely free. But along with its success have come more and more efforts to capitalize on it, from private enterprise as well as from the government. More changes loom ahead.

Among the biggest players online is America Online, and it recently made the controversial move of giving large emailers preferential treatment by paying a fee to bypass its spam filters through Goodmail Systems’ Certi-fied Email service (www.goodmailsystems.com).

This has people in an uproar for a number of reasons.

One concern is that AOL’s move will increase junk email, already a huge time wasting, productivity sapping problem. Another concern is that AOL is creating an un-fair two-tiered email system, with large companies able to pay to bypass AOL’s malfunctioning spam filters and small businesses, nonprofit organizations and individu-als unable to reach many intended recipients. A third concern is that if AOL succeeds with its project, every-body will eventually have to pay to be assured of fast and reliable email.

In response, hundreds of small businesses and non-profit organizations have teamed together to create the Dear AOL.com Coalition (www.dearaol.com), apply-ing pressure on AOL, Yahoo and other Internet service providers to stop or reject such pay-to-send schemes.

Among the members of the coalition are the liberal MoveOn.org and con-servative RightMarch.com political action com-mittees.

Pay-to-send email isn’t a new concept; Microsoft talked about it a decade ago. It has fi-nally arrived. Whether it succeeds depends partly on individual users like us mak-ing our voices heard. AOL isn’t the only way to access the Internet, and if subscribers don’t like its policies, they can always move on.

To improve the reliability of your email delivery to AOL.com email addresses, visit www.GoodMailSystems.com.

Telecommunications and cable companies have pro-posed to offer preferential treatment to websites in the transmission of their data packets, for a fee. This “packet prioritization” would enable those sites to be faster and more responsive than other sites.

Critics charge this will give an unfair advantage to large companies and will hurt small business, associa-tions, nonprofits and individuals.

Consumer groups and Internet companies such as Google and Amazon.com oppose packet prioritization. As Congress considers legislation that would rewrite the country’s telecommunications laws, these organizations are lobbying for “net neutrality,” also called “network neutrality.”

Other companies that think they can benefit from pack-et prioritization are lobbying to keep the legal framework as it is. Individuals can join in the lobbying effort, too, and let their elected representatives know how they feel. Faxes are more effective than email, and old-fashioned mailed letters are more effective than faxes.

These systems would allow info-marketers to pay an additional fee so streaming audio and video on their websites could be delivered more quickly and depend-ably over the Internet. The IMA will continue to follow this legislation and keep you informed as it moves through Congress.

Getting Email Delivered to AOL.com Subscribers

Faster Internet Downloads, for a Fee



Ed O’Keefe with Dentist Profits went from being a college student majoring in nursing

to a motivational speaker to a book writer, and has used the skills he picked up along the way to create an extremely profitable information marketing business that provides “done-for-you” marketing for den-tists.

Two years out of college, Ed was “dead broke” and tired of traveling from place to place trying to make a living from speaking to schools, busi-nesses and athletic groups. “Quite honestly, it was no fun fighting for gig after gig,” Ed remembers.

Attending a Dan Kennedy Cus-tomer Appreciation Event helped put Ed on a new road to success. He bought Dan’s Magnetic Market-ing toolkit and put it to work. His first info product was the Ultimate Mental Toughness Training for Vol-leyball Players and Coaches, and he was able to tailor that product for several niches. Several years later, Ed was making “some money, but not much,” so he started looking for an-other opportunity. This time he put some of his college skills to work and hit the library.

Ed believes it is important for any-one in the info business to “choose the market before you choose the product.” How do you do you that? In a word: RESEARCH.

Ed began his research with the yellow pages. He went through the entire book, noting the number of ads for each profession and niche industry.

“The girl I was dating at the time thought I was absolutely nuts. She’s like—‘What are you doing?’ And I said, ‘I’m getting rich, honey,’” Ed

After exhaustive study, Ed O’Keefe concluded that the dentistry profession offered the greatest opportunity to his business. In just a couple of years he has built an extensive information marketing business including a kit marketed to new customers, a membership program paid for on monthly continuity, annual “Super Conference” coaching programs and several services so dentists can put their marketing on autopilot.

INFO-MARKETER PROFILE

Hard Work and Research Pay OffTurnkey Marketing for Dentists Is Big Business

continued on page 8


says, smiling and shaking his head. “I knew I needed a change. I remember seeing one guy selling software for 99 bucks a month, and it hit me right in the face. I did the math. There I was schlepping my $47.00 book and au-diotapes to coaches who didn’t have any money. That software guy wasn’t any more intelligent than you or me or anyone else. He was just doing something right!”

Ed was determined to find his own “right thing,” so he researched 47 different industries and professions. He called trade publications and requested media kits. He found out how many people were involved in each niche. He looked at the media already reaching each niche. As Ed says, “Everyone says to go find a target market and research it, but not too many people go into as much detail as I did. But it’s so beneficial.”

As part of his research, Ed also consulted the SRDS (Standard Rate and Data Service). This is a book you can find in most local libraries that includes lists of all mailing lists available for purchase. It can help an info-marketer discover the groups that might want to buy a particular product. The SRDS breaks down lists by state, demographics, the number of people who have bought a product and so on.

With his research done, Ed was ready to choose his market. Now Ed does direct-mail lead-generation campaigns for dentists. Dentists can sign up for Ed’s system, select the types of patients they want and then Ed takes care of all of the market-ing. The dentists are notified when the postcards go in the mail, and the next thing they know, they have new patients calling the office. Ed’s cus-tomers don’t have to learn anything. All they have to do is ask Ed to take care of the service, and he handles everything.

On any given day, Ed has a check-

Ed uses celebrities to get attention and attract attendees to his “Bigger-Than-Ever 2006 ULTIMATE Practice Profit Explo-sion Super Conference.” He created a letter and a series of postcards promoting the event by marketing Amy Henry (star from the first season of Donald Trump’s, THE APPREN-TICE), the Hummer H3 he is giving away as part of a con-test at the event and an update on the positive feedback he received from his 2005 event.

HARDWORK & RESEARCH CONTINUED FROM PAGE 7


list of things he must complete by the end of the day. Generally speaking, most of the items on his list have something to do with obtaining new customers for his business. He always has his eye on the front end of his business. “I’ve noticed that when I take my eye off my front end, my back end slows up,” Ed says.

Asked about how he goes about generating leads, Ed says, “Num-ber one is using every medium you can afford. Number two is converting with free telesemi-nars—we never stop mailing to leads, either offering a free telese-minar or sending out postcards. What works is doing as much as we possibly can every single month to put as many offers out there as is humanly possible.”

Ed has also built backend conti-nuity programs into his business. “We’ll give our dentists the kit for free and then flip them into our $450.00 a month coaching,” Ed explains.

Another strategy Ed uses to build his business is develop-ing strategic relationships with others who are working with his niche. “I’ve always believed that being in the same tent and work-ing together is better than trying to compete with each other,” Ed says.

Ed has two cautions for begin-ning info-marketers:

“First, you can’t gauge an opportu-nity’s potential based on the suc-cess people had three, five, ten years ago—or even last year. Years ago the cost per lead might have been just a few dollars. Dan Kennedy has taught me to find ways to create the eco-nomics so you can win by spending $100.00 or even $1,000.00 per sale.”

One of the ways to create this type of business is through higher end, geographic or territory exclusivity

programs. In these programs, a high end offer such as coaching is made available to just one person in a particular area. “If you sell a terri-tory for $40,000.00, you can afford to spend five or eight grand to get one client,” Ed explains. Still, Ed believes

selling a turnkey direct mail program to 2,000 clients might be a better money generator than selling one very high end coaching program.

Ed’s second caution is to know the

continued on page 10

Ed uses a two-page order form to sell his com-prehensive kit to dentists. Kit sales are his main source of acquiring new customers.


difference between sales and cash flow. “$30,000.00 in sales does not mean $30,000.00 in cash flow,” Ed warns. “Number one, you need to get your customers into a continu-ity program as quickly as possible to recoup some of your advertising and marketing costs. Number two, you should raise your membership fee to whatever it needs to be so you can afford spending more money on the front end.”

Ed practices what he preaches. His silver membership is $450.00 per month. Three and half years ago, that membership was priced at $19.99. Ed finds that he has better custom-ers who complain less at the higher price, and now he has customers au-tomatically worth $5,200.00 per year.

Ed provides turnkey marketing so-lutions for his clients and welcomes joint ventures with other niches. For more information, call 773/779-3413 and ask for Darcy, Ed’s assistant.

Ed O’Keefe’s Inner CircleMember Benefits

FOR THOSE INTERESTED IN DOING WHATTHEY DO FASTER, EASIER, AND MORE PROFITABLY!

‘Silver’ Inner Circle Membership at $450 per month. Participation in Silver includes:• Ed O’Keefe’s Monthly Insider Marketing Newsletter• Access to the “Members Wealth Portal” virtual masterminding on

our exclusive Web-based forum with access to audio/video training modules

• Access to downloadable, customizable, successful ads being run by other dentists all across the country. Get what’s working and get it now!

• Monthly Exclusive “Ed O’Keefe Interviews …” CDs• Weekly Insider Marketing Tips via fax• Three live coaching calls with Ed every month• One special Closed Door Meeting with Ed and the other Silver Mem-

bers per year• 2 H3 Marketing Critiques

‘Gold’ Inner Circle Membership for $850 per month. Participation in Gold includes every benefit offered in Silver, Plus:• Customized Consultations with Ed; Gold members get two custom-

ized consultations each year where Ed will record his answers at your fingertips

• Two private emergency access calls per year to get immediate an-swers from Ed

• Our Monthly “Magical Smiles & Motivational Mentor” Patient News-letter, free for one year

• 5 pre-arranged private phone consultations per year• 3 Closed Door Meetings per year with Ed and the rest of the Gold

Members• 6 H3 Marketing Critiques• Free Tuition to the 2006 Ultimate Dental Practice Profit Explosion

Super Conference• Exclusive access to all celebrities brought in to our live seminars


Insider’s Peek

One of the key profit centers of Ed O’Keefe’s business, Dentist Profits, is his monthly continuity program. In 3-1/2 years he has increased the price of his continuity program from $19.99 a month to $450.00 a month. Here is an insider’s peek at the ben-efits of Ed’s continuity program.


“Ed was determined to find his own ‘right thing,’ so he researched 47 different industries and professions. He called trade publica-tions and requested media kits. He found out how many people were involved in each niche.”


Ed has a comprehensive postcard mailing service for dentists who need assistance getting marketing pro-grams implemented. While dentists receive these cards as part of their initial kit purchase, by creating a “done-for-them” service, Ed adds a lot of value to his customers because they don’t have to go through the hassle of redesigning the card, find-ing a printer, buying a list and get-ting them mailed. Once dentists be-gin using this service and obtain new patients, they become extremely loyal customers of Ed and his services.


A Week in the Life of Ed O’KeefeDentistprofits.com takes work, but it is manageable work. Ed likes to be home by 5:30 or 6:00 p.m. each day to have dinner with his family. His typical work week looks like this:

12INFORMATION MARKETING INSIDERS’ JOURNAL OCTOBER 200612INFORMATION MARKETING INSIDERS’ JOURNAL SEPTEMBER 2006


Jordan McAuley has been an info-marketer for a long time. Since high school, as a matter of fact.

McAuley remembers, “In high school, I just wanted to make some extra money. I started paying atten-tion to copywriting and ads I found in newspapers and magazines. I bought a celebrity address list from


Meet an Info-marketing ‘Lifer’Jordan McAuley Started His First Business as a High Schooler

an ad on the back of one of those business opportunity rag magazines. That was the start of my database.”

Jordan began offering his celebrity lists to people who wanted to send fan letters to request autographed photos of the their favorite TV per-sonalities and other famous people. He remembers getting a check in the

mail for $300.00 and asking himself why he bothered working at a video store for only $5.00 an hour when there was so much more money to be made in his business. His mom wasn’t so enthusiastic, though. Jordan remembers her saying, “What are you doing? It’s illegal. You’re probably going to go to jail.” Not many high school kids were doing info-marketing, so it’s not surprising that Jordan’s mom was worried.

But Jordan was learning some-thing very important in addition to making a ton of money for a kid his age. Jordan discovered he liked the marketing aspects of the information marketing business and found him-self studying headlines and advertis-ing content. So when it came time for college, he pursued something relat-ed to marketing. He studied the film and entertainment business—how to design posters for movies, issue press releases, conduct publicity and set up press junkets.

Jordan recalls that his parents were a little disappointed about his choice of major, because they wanted him to become a director instead of focus-ing on the marketing aspects of the business. But Jordan took full advan-tage of the opportunities in the film and entertainment business, doing internships at CNN in the publicity department, for a modeling agency in South Beach and with Turner Enter-tainment in Atlanta. These opportu-nities helped Jordan learn the busi-ness side of marketing and publicity. He also did some reading on the side. Books like Melvin Powers’ How to Get Rich in Mail Order. Jordan thinks he got the best of both worlds that way.

continued on page 14 continued on page 14


him to keep looking for a “real” job, but Jordan decided to focus on his business full time. It exploded, and Jordan had a full-time career doing what he likes to do.

Jordan began to study self publish-ing, and his stapled pieces of paper with celebrity address lists became the Celebrity Black Book (www.celebri-tyblackbook.com). That led to a new product called “How to Become a Number One Best Selling Author and Make Your Book Famous.” Jordan began having authors ask him how he had published and distributed his book, so he knew there was another market he could tap.

Jordan licensed an information product, but added a couple of bonus reports on how to get testimoni-als from celebrities. In this way, he was able to take a product that was already created so he could begin selling immediately, but by adding his own special reports, he was able to differentiate his product from everything else being promoted by other product licensees.

One of his members, Jacqueline Marcel, used his service, and Jordan reports, “got 50 testimonials for one of her books from a whole bunch of famous people. She had never written a book before. She didn’t know what she was doing. She didn’t have any contacts. But because of the testimo-nials she was able to get, she ended up on the cover of AARP’s maga-zine.” Now Jacqueline is a full-time speaker, and she attributes her suc-cess to the celebrity endorsements that first drew attention to her book.

After attending a Dan Kennedy seminar in Atlanta, Jordan realized he needed to offer additional products and services to his past customers. He now offers a continuity program in which his members have access to a celebrity database that is up-dated daily. It contains celebrities’ addresses as well as their managers’

INFO-MARKETING LIFER CONTINUED FROM PAGE 13

The business side from his college internship experiences and the grass roots “how the world really works” from the info-marketing books he read.

After settling in at college, Jordan started looking for ways to run his business through the Internet, which was just beginning to take off in the mid-1990s. First he needed a way to process credit cards, and the college sophomore was finding it difficult to find a website or company that would help a small business like his. Then there was a “stroke of luck,” as Jordan calls it. “I applied for a merchant account, and I got it. They probably should have checked me out a little bit since I was living in a college dorm, but somehow I got it and started processing credit cards. Everything just started to snowball. I was still building up my list and learning more about what ad agen-cies do, what managers do, and just working at this job.”

Jordan soon realized there were ways to transform his business, like offering his lists to businesses, nonprofits and people in the media working in Hollywood. So by redefin-ing what his market was, Jordan was able to drastically expand the types of

people who would buy his product.

Jordan still considered his info-marketing business a hobby. A big money-making hobby, but still a hobby. He moved to L.A. after college to pursue his “real” career in the entertainment business. He took a job working as a delivery person for a production company. “In Hollywood, even if you’ve gone to college, you still start out running around just delivering stuff for like $10.00 an hour,” Jordan explains.

He kept that job for a year and continued to work on his business, always making more money that way but still thinking he wanted a career in entertainment. Then he got a job at a talent agency assisting an agent in Beverly Hills. While there, Jordan learned what kind of mail gets past the receptionist’s desk, which calls get through. It was a great behind the scenes look at what goes on in a major agency. It was also a big eye-opener for Jordan.

“I got yelled at every day by my agent. Those places are very cut-throat, and you have to be a certain type of person to work in such an aggressive environment,” Jordan says. “So I quit, much to my parents’ dismay.” Jordan’s parents wanted

Jordan McAuley has taken a product that used to be sold in the back of comic books to autograph seekers and turned it into a full-scale information product. He transformed the market by expanding the types of potential customers to in-clude charities and businesses, plus he changed the product by adding online access, search capability by several variables and celebrity agents’ and pub-licists’ contact info. For details on his product, visit www.IMACelebrityResource.com.


Jordan took the case examples of indi-viduals who used celebrity endorsements and quotes and turned them into an easy to follow manual for authors interested in publicity for their books. For all of the product details, visit www.IMAProduct-Showcase.com/FamousBook.

and agents’ names, and everything is indexed. For ex-ample, if a charity such as the Ameri-can Cancer Society is looking for a celebrity to work on a project, typing in the word “cancer” will show which celebrities have con-tributed their time to promote cancer research.

Jordan also has a new book com-ing out in a couple of months called Secrets to Contact-ing Celebrities. This product will ap-peal to anyone who wants to learn how to attend events like film festivals or conventions where celebrities and sports teams are going to be signing autographs.

Another future project for Jor-dan is a book or other product for nonprofits. Jordan wants to do an information product for nonprofits to help them raise money. He has tes-timonials from nonprofits that have used his lists to obtain autographed photos that they auction off. These organizations have found they can spend a few hours and a couple of hundred dollars and receive thou-sands of dollars’ worth of celebrity photos and other items to auction.

Jordan has no shortage of ideas for building his business, including affiliate relationships. He signs up af-filiates all the time with his program at www.contactanycelebrity.com/affiliates

that pays 50 percent for every sign up and then 50 percent every month.

He is also looking for people who have had experience with celebrities who would like to work with him on teleseminars for his members, which include fans, nonprofits and chari-ties, authors and writers, and entre-preneurs and businesspeople. People interested in offering a product to Jordan’s members or participating in a teleseminar can email Jordan at [email protected].




We often hear about infor-mation marketers taking their direct mail business-

es and transitioning them to work on the Internet. Brett Fogle with OptionsUniversity is doing just the opposite, going from selling ebooks online to using direct mail, other

In less than a year, Brett Fogle created a new product and launched a million-dollar info-busi-ness. For IMA members, he reveals how he did it and the insider secrets he discovered. For all of the details about Brett’s OptionsUniversity Home Study Course, visit www.IMAProductShowcase.com/Options.

Building an Info-marketing Business With Joint VenturesHow One Internet Marketer Went From Zero to 7 Figures With Zero Advertising

media and joint ventures to build his business into a full-scale information marketing business.

Brett’s primary market is people who have identified themselves as being interested in stock market trad-ing or options trading. “Options are hot right now,” says Brett. “I started

an advisory service three years ago for options, and it didn’t really take off. So I temporarily walked away from trading and delved into Internet marketing.”

Brett established two criteria for his info-marketing business:



1. He would sell an information product; and

2. The market would be people with a large amount of disposable income.

“At that point the only two mar-kets I could think of were Internet marketing and stock trading,” Brett remembers, “and the Internet mar-keting field was pretty well saturated. Long story short, I went back to my contact list and found the best op-tions guy I could. I got really lucky because he’s probably the best in the country.”

Brett connected with Ron Ianieri, who was a floor trader for 15 years, including four years as the lead mar-ket maker in Dell computer options. In addition to being a leading expert in options trading, Ianieri turned out to be an excellent teacher and the perfect match for Brett’s business.

When Brett went to the Info-Mar-keting Summit and heard Dan Ken-nedy describe the ideal front man, Ron Ianieri fit the bill exactly for the market Brett wanted to reach. “At first Ron primarily helped with the content, but as customers realized how knowledgeable he is, Ron really opened doors for us,” Brett says.

In just two years, Brett has been able to grow his business from zero to over seven figures in sales per year. “That’s with zero advertising!” Brett exclaims. “I’ve done it exclusively

through joint ventures.”

Brett approached a well known Internet marketer, Steven Pierce, who was also in the stock arena. He had a very successful product called Fibo-nacciSecrets™. Pierce turned down Brett’s initial proposal, so Brett tried his promotion with a lesser known info-marketer who was happy to do a joint venture deal.

Once he had results to show Pierce, the two were able to launch a joint venture that did very well. Brett leveraged the success of his first two JVs to land more deals. “Joint

ventures are a very effective way to get started,” Brett says. “For anybody who is getting started in information marketing, and specifically online, I would recom-mend JVs as the easiest and best way to do it.”

For example, Brett has an exclusive marketing deal with a brokerage company that pays a five-figure fee every quarter for refer-ring all of his leads to the firm. He also taps businesses that want access to his customers to sponsor seminars and events.

Brett continues to use JVs as his primary business builder because he thinks they are the biggest and fastest way to grow a business. He hired an affiliate manager last year to go out and find JVs for his busi-ness. They structure the partnerships so the JV partner gets 35 percent of sales and the affiliate manager gets 10 percent. Using JVs has worked so well that Brett has expanded his business internationally.

Brett recently did an investment cruise attended by several strong international promoters. “We had

partnered with another company who dropped it in our lap and said, ‘Let’s do a cruise,’” Brett recalls. “We saw it as sort of a test to prove we could do it. It was an extremely short time-frame. I think it was about 45 days from the time we had to start mar-keting it until the end of the room block. It was successful, though.” The success Brett had with the in-vestment cruise has led to seminars planned this fall in the United King-dom and Ireland. He is considering a seminar in Australia next year.

One of the ways Brett promotes his product is through Google ads. By hiring an experienced copywriter and tinkering with his website, Brett has cut his costs per lead in half.

“We used to have several different ads that sent leads to one landing page for a free report to get the opt in,” Brett explains. “Now we have very specific ad campaigns tar-geted to either beginners or to more advance traders. Each ad goes to a separate landing page that’s slightly different. This has boosted our con-versions.”

Brett is also using direct marketing to promote his products. He started with a sales letter that he tested to five different lists. He also split test using a third-class stamp versus a first-class stamp to see if the more expensive postage would get his mail into the “A” pile instead of “straight into the trash.” Even though the first-class postage cost Brett more upfront, his results have been signifi-cantly better.

“Everybody thought I was crazy,” Brett says. “The mail house, the printer and the list broker, they were all questioning why I wanted to use first-class postage because none of their other customers do it that way.

“But that’s one of the secrets of why it works. Dan Kennedy always says if everyone says you’re crazy or going in the wrong direction, you’re

“‘Everybody thought I was crazy,’ Brett says. ‘The mail house, the print-er and the list broker, they were all questioning why I wanted to use first-class postage because none of their other customers do it that way.’”

BUILDING AN INFO-BUSINESS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 17



probably right!”

Brett’s business includes several different products, all aimed toward options traders who want to learn more about making money in the stock market. Options 101 launched two years ago, and over time Brett has made changes to it to keep customers buying. His most recent product is the Options Mastery Series, which is a 20-CD set. His products also include binders, videos and roundtable calls.

All of the Options products use high-end graphic design, and Brett has turned to outside vendors to help him create products to appeal to his customers.

“I’m a big fan of outsourcing, and I have a very good team of people all over the world,” Brett says. “My graphics designer is in New Zealand. My programmer for software is in Si-beria. I’ve got VAs (virtual assistants) in Canada and across the United States that handle different things.”

Brett also outsources fulfillment using companies in New York and Georgia to ship product to his cus-tomers.

According to Brett, the hardest part of the info-marketing business is having to juggle all of the compo-nents of the business at the same time: from marketing to customer

service to product returns to creat-ing new products. “That’s why I’ve made it a priority to outsource more of the non-essential parts like book-keeping and updating the website.” By outsourcing, Brett can focus on marketing, creating joint ventures and coming up with new sales ideas.

A New Way To Do Joint Ventures

Brett is doing something brand new to promote joint ventures, and he has given IMA permission to share this idea with our members.

Brett started with email blasts to promote his online affiliate program. He provided ads that his partners could send out to their email lists. “Two years ago, that was enough,” Brett says. “As things have become more competitive and people are bombarded with more advertise-ments in their email, it’s getting harder to get email delivered.” So Brett decided to try something more creative.

He found that his teleseminars were “incidental” to his success. The real value was in the excuse it gave him to email the customer three, four or five times. Here is how it works. Brett’s joint venture partners send an email that says to “look for an email next Tuesday for a special

announcement you’re really going to want to see.” This initial email pre-sells the message. Then on Tuesday the JV partner sends an email say-ing, “Here’s where you can register for a free teleseminar we’re having on Thursday.” The email includes short copy of a testimonial with a strong headline to sell the custom-ers on registering for the call. Then on Thursday they send out another reminder before the call. They record the call so on Friday they can send another email that says, “Just in case you missed it, here’s the replay for sale.” On Sunday an email goes out letting customers know they have 12 hours left to buy or there are only 20 copies left.

To maximize attendance on the actual call, Brett asks for a telephone number and sends a voice broadcast 30 minutes before the call: “Hi, this is Ron Ianieri. I just wanted to re-mind you about our call tonight. It’s going to be really valuable and here’s why. In case you don’t have the num-ber here it is again. Also check your email, I just emailed it to you.”

Brett has found he receives many of his sales through the product de-scriptions and calls to action within the teleconference reminder messag-es. Call registrants read those emails



for updates or additional details about the teleseminar they’ve signed up for. Many choose to purchase the product before they even partici-pate on the call. Not only does this method create sales before the call, but it also increases conversions on the call itself.

Using email and phone reminders, Brett has boosted actual attendance rates on his teleseminars from 35 percent up to 45 to 50 percent. And being able to handle large attendance numbers is no problem.

Brett has found a platform for teleseminars that can handle 600 to 800 people with voice over IP. It’s called omnovia.com. “It’s a browser based platform, so it’s not going to bog down the server. They’re saying they can probably get the number of participants up to 2,000 by next year. So that really opens up a lot of doors,” Brett says.

Brett shares another secret: Over the last six months he has been re-placing teleseminars with Web semi-nars. This has the added advantage of attracting international participants who don’t want to pay long distance phone charges. Brett also finds that more people actually show up and sales are dramatically higher.

Brett attributes the Web seminars’ success to several things. First, it’s new technology so people find it interesting. Second, it involves all of the senses. Instead of doing the dishes or checking email while listen-ing to a phone call, participants are watching as well as listening to the seminar. Third and perhaps most

Joint Venture Sources

Brett Fogle launched his info-business, OptionsUniver-sity through joint ventures with other businesses. Here are his sources for finding potential partners:

• Searched Google for sites serving his target market, then contacted the ones that looked the best

• Hired a JV manager to conduct research, locate, con-tact and create agreements with partners for a 10-percent commission on any JV sales he found

• Received referrals from existing JVs

• Pooled names with other marketers with a list broker who controls how many times each partner can use the list

five-pronged plan to get there:

1. Media exposure. Brett has hired a PR person to help with this.

2. Using “bounce-back offers.” (These are offers sent with products purchased by customers within the actual product package.)

3. Live seminars (Brett plans to tape these and then test selling the broadcasts to customers who couldn’t attend.)

4. Web seminars.

5. Hire more JV managers to find and implement more joint ven-ture opportunities.

IMA members interested in doing a joint venture with Brett Fogles’ OptionsUniversity can email him directly at [email protected].

important is the social proof factor. Participants see how many others are involved, and that in itself helps sell the product.

“A chat window lists all the people in the room. So everybody sees there are 500 or 600 other people partici-pating. When someone says, ‘I just bought mine. I can’t wait to get it,’ you see a whole avalanche of people following to buy it also,” Brett ex-plains. “The chat room portion of the Web seminar simulates the crowd at the back of the room that you get during in-person seminars.”

Brett also uses limited high-end product sales effectively. By offer-ing only ten of a high-priced item, he finds that as soon as a few people say they want it, the rest sell very quickly.

Brett has set a high sales target for next year, and he has developed a

BUILDING AN INFO-BUSINESS CONTINUED FROM PAGE 19

“Brett shares another secret: Over the last six months he has been replacing teleseminars with Web seminars.”


OPERATIONS


You must know which ads are performing so you know how to adjust your future spending to maxi-mize your marketing investment. Fortunately, info-

marketers have always been measurement oriented.

However, the realities are challenging. A marketing campaign might involve five emails, three mailings, a teleseminar, newsletter inserts and telemarketing. How can you determine which pieces were essential to the sale, or which had the most impact? It’s rare that an info-mar-keter has the patience and discipline to set up controlled experiments to test all of the variables involved.

Despite these difficulties, info-marketers must learn to always focus on a few key metrics that are easy to gather and analyze. Well, they may not be “easy” to gather, but at least they are straightforward and provide essential busi-ness statistics.

Essential Metric #1: Cost Per LeadThe cost of a lead is determined by each individual

medium. If you place an ad in a magazine, and the ad costs you $1,000.00 and you generate 100 leads from that ad, then the cost of the lead is $10.00. (Computation $1,000.00 Ad Cost ÷ 100 Leads = $10.00 Per Lead)

Let’s make this a little bit more complicated.

If you place one ad for $1,000.00 in Journal A and an-other ad in Journal B for $500.00, and Journal A continues to get 100 leads while Journal B generates 25 leads, your cost per lead for Journal A is still $10.00, but your cost per lead for Journal B is $20.00. You will want to create track-ing mechanisms so you know which leads come from which publications so you can calculate your lead cost for each ad.

You should not automatically abandon the more expen-sive lead generation systems for the less expensive. Even though you may not be making a profit with a particular

medium, if you are able to generate new customers and offer them additional products and services later, it is still wise to continue to use the more expensive lead generator.

Essential Metric # 2: Product Cost/Gross MarginOne of the benefits of selling information products is

that their manufacturing costs are quite low. Usually you are able to sell a product for ten times or more what it costs to create. The cost of creating the product has noth-ing to do with the value of the product to your customer. In the info-marketing business, your product costs should be no more than 10 percent of your sales price. The marketing costs are going to be a large enough factor that most info-marketers try to avoid products with a sales price anything less than ten times your cost of creating it.

Example: If you are selling a product priced at $500.00, your cost to print materials, purchase binders, produce and print covers, reproduce audio, produce audio jackets, produce reports, handling and storage should cost you $50.00 or less.

If your product sales price is $500.00 and your fulfill-ment cost is $50.00, then $450.00 is your gross margin:

Please note: The 10 times markup is presented as a gen-eral industry average for a new product. Many info-market-ers choose their prices for different reasons, including

Essential Metrics for Info-marketersTo make good business judgments you need a firm grasp of your numbers.

Publication A Publication B Total Lead Costs

Ad Cost $1,000.00 Ad Cost $500.00 Ad Cost $1,500.00

Leads Generated ÷ 100 Leads Generated ÷ 25 Leads Generated ÷ 125

Cost Per Lead = $10.00 Cost Per Lead = $20.00 Cost Per lead = $12.00

#1: COST PER LEAD

#2: GROSS MARGIN

Sales Price $500.00

Fulfillment Costs - $50.00

Gross Margin = $450.00


OPERATIONS continued from page 21

market conditions and volume considerations. This example is not to be considered price setting or creating minimum markups for the info-marketing industry. You are encouraged to set your own prices at whatever you wish to meet your individual business goals.

Essential Metric #3 – Marketing Cost Per SaleLet’s return to the example we created to illustrate

Cost Per Lead. Our cost of advertising in Journals A and B combined was $1,500.00 per month; those ads generated 125 leads.

Now you have to spend money to convert those 125 leads into sales. In your marketing sequence you have four or five letters, some faxes and maybe some audio CDs to help sell your product, and these items cost you $20.00 per lead.

The good news is that 20 people purchased your prod-uct. Most people would be quick to focus on the response percentage (20 ÷ 125 = 16%), but that is meaningless. Instead, you should compute and track the cost per sale.

Now your total market costs are $4,000.00. You spent $1,500.00 in lead generation materials to produce 125 leads. Then you sent a marketing campaign to those leads costing a total of $2,500.00 Therefore you have:

Now we can calculate your Marketing Cost Per Sale:

Essential Metric #4 – Return on Investment (ROI)

Return on investment is one of the key statistics info-marketers use to evaluate a medium. It is calculated by comparing total revenue to the lead generation medium cost.

Let’s return to our example from above. Our lead gen-eration ads cost $1,500.00. From those leads we made 20 sales at $500.00 for total revenue of $10,000.00.

We calculate return on investment from that lead gen-eration as follows:

There are a lot of variations on the ROI calculation. Some info-marketers use net revenue to factor in sales and fulfillment costs. However, this is the calculation you hear quoted most often.

Essential Metric #5 – Lifetime Customer Value As your info-business transitions from a one-product

business into an integrated info-marketing company, one of the key metrics will become lifetime customer value.

Lifetime customer value is calculated by tracking the purchases each customer makes over a period of time. Then you divide that figure by the number of customers that have purchased from you during the same period.

It is important to track this calculation based on seg-ments of your customers. Here are several ways to com-pare the lifetime value of your customers:

• The lifetime value of customers who participate in your continuity program versus those who are not subscribers

• The lifetime value of customers who attend your boot camps versus those who do not

• The lifetime value of customers generated out of one lead generation campaign versus the others

• The lifetime value of customers by region of the coun-try, sex and/or ethnicity

#3: COST PER SALE (A)

#3: COST PER SALE (B)

Lead Generation Advertising - $1,500.00

Marketing Campaign to Leads + $2,500.00

Total Marketing Costs = $4,000.00

#3: COST PER SALE (C)

Total Marketing Costs $4,000.00

Number of Sales ÷ 20

Marketing Cost Per Sale = $200.00

Plus Product Fulfillment Costs + $50.00

Total Costs Per Sale = $250.00

#3: COST PER SALE (D)

Sales Revenue $10,000.00

Less Ad Costs - $1,500.00

Return = $8,500.00

Divided by Ad Costs ÷ 1,500.00

Equals ROI = 566%

Cost of your sales process to convert a lead into a customer $20.00Number of leads put through that sales process x 125Total cost of sales conversion process = $2,500.00


Sooner or later, almost all writ-ers quote or closely paraphrase what others have written. For

example:

• Andy, putting together a newslet-ter, reprints an advertisement he likes from a weekly magazine.

• Phil uses a quote he wrote down from a seminar.

• Regina, a freelance writer, closely paraphrases two paragraphs from a published product in an article she’s writing.

• Sylvia quotes a line from a book by Dan Kennedy in one of her

When Copying Is O.K: The ‘Fair Use’ Rule

own teleseminars.

• Donnie writes a parody of an ad he published within his product.

Assuming the material quoted in these examples is protected by copy-right, do Phil, Regina, Sylvia, Andy and Donnie need permission from the author or other copyright owner to use it? It may surprise you to learn the answer is “not necessarily.”

Under the “fair use” rule of copy-right law, an author may make limited use of another author’s work without asking permission. Fair use is based on the belief that the public is entitled to freely use portions of

In some situations, you may make limited use of another’s work without asking permission.


copyrighted materials for purposes of commentary and criticism. The fair use privilege is perhaps the most significant limitation on a copyright owner’s exclusive rights. If you write or publish, you need a basic under-standing of what is and is not fair use.

Uses That Are Generally Fair Uses

Subject to some general limitations discussed later in this article, the following types of uses are usually deemed fair uses:

Getting Permission - How to License & Clear Copyrighted Materials Online & OffIf you plan to use any copyrighted material for your own purposes, you need to get permission first from the owners of that work. If you don’t, you could find yourself slapped with a lawsuit. This book, Get-ting Permission, tackles the permissions process head on. It shines the light on whom to ask for permission as well as when—and how much to expect to pay for permission. Comprehensive and easy to read, the book covers: the permissions process; the public domain; copyright research; fair use; academic permissions; the elements of a license and merchandise agreement; the use of a trademark or fiction-al character; and much more.

Getting Permission includes agreements for acquiring authorization to use text, photographs, artwork and music. All agreements included as tear-outs and on CD-ROM.

IMA members can save $5.25 and buy this $34.99 book for only $29.74. Visit www.NOLOPermission.com.


FAIR USE RULE continued from page 23

• Criticism and comment. For example, quoting or excerpting a work in a review or criticism for purposes of illustration or com-ment.

• News reporting. For example, summarizing an address or ar-ticle, with brief quotations, in a news report.

• Research and scholarship. For example, quoting a short pas-sage in a scholarly, scientific or technical work for illustration or clarification of the author’s observations.

• Nonprofit educational uses. For example, photocopying lim-ited portions of written works by teachers for classroom use.

• Parody. Work that ridicules an-other, usually well-known, work by imitating it in a comic way.

In most other situations, copying is not legally a fair use. Without an author’s permission, such a use vio-lates the author’s copyright.

Violations often occur when the use is motivated primarily by a desire for commercial gain. The fact that a work is published primarily for pri-vate commercial gain weighs against a finding of fair use. For example, using the Bob Dylan line “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows” in a poem published in a small literary journal would probably be a fair use; using the same line in an advertisement for raincoats probably would not be.

A commercial motive doesn’t al-ways disqualify someone from claim-ing a fair use. A use that benefits the public can qualify as a fair use, even

if it makes money for the user.

For example, a vacuum cleaner manufacturer was permitted—in its advertising—to quote from a Consum-er Reports article comparing vacuum cleaners. Why? The ad significantly increased the number of people exposed to the Consumers Reports’ evaluations and thereby disseminated helpful consumer information. The same rationale probably applies to the widespread practice of quoting from favorable reviews in advertise-ments for books and audio programs.

When Is a Use a ‘Fair Use’?

There are five basic rules to keep in mind when deciding whether or not a particular use of an author’s work is a fair use:

Rule 1: Are You Creating Something New or Just Copy-ing?

The purpose and character of your intended use of the material involved is the single most important factor in determining whether a use is a fair use. The question to ask here is whether you are merely copying someone else’s work verbatim or instead using it to help create some-thing new. The Supreme Court calls such a new work “transformative.” The more transformative your work, the more likely your use is a fair use.

Rule 2: Are You Competing With the Source You’re Copy-ing From?

Without consent, you ordinarily cannot use another person’s protect-ed expression in a way that impairs (or even potentially impairs) the market for his or her work. Thus, if you want to use an author’s pro-tected expression in a work of your own that is similar to the prior work and aimed at the same market, your

intended use isn’t likely a fair use.

For example, say Nick, a golf pro, writes a book on how to play golf. Not a good putter himself, he copies several brilliant paragraphs on put-ting from a book by Lee Trevino, one of the greatest putters in golf his-tory. Because Nick intends his book to compete with and even supplant Trevino’s, this use is not a fair use. In effect, Nick is trying to use Trevino’s protected expression to eat into the sales of Trevino’s own book.

An interesting example is when a teacher copies parts of books for students to use. In one recent case, a group of seven major publishers went to court and stopped a duplicating business from copying excerpts from books without permission, compiling them into “course packets” and sell-ing them to college students.

Rule 3: Giving the Author Credit Doesn’t Let You Off the Hook

Some people mistakenly believe they can use any material as long as they properly give the author credit. Not true. Giving credit and fair use are completely separate concepts. Either you have the right to use another author’s material under the fair use rule or you don’t. The fact that you attribute the material to the other author doesn’t change that.

Rule 4: The More You Take, the Less Fair Your Use Is Likely to Be

The more material you take, the less likely it is that your use will be a fair use. As a general rule, never quote more than a few successive paragraphs from a book or article, or take more than one chart or diagram. It is never proper to include an il-lustration or other artwork in a book or newsletter without the artist’s permission. Don’t quote more than one or two lines from a poem. Many

“Violations often occur when the use is motivat-ed primarily by a desire for commercial gain. ”


publishers require their authors to obtain permission from an author to quote more then a specified number of words, ranging from about 100 to 1,000 words.

Contrary to what many people be-lieve, there is no absolute word limit on fair use. For example, it is not always O.K. to take one paragraph of fewer than 200 words. Copying 200 words from a work of 300 words wouldn’t be fair use. Nor would copying 12 words from a 14-word haiku poem. However, copying 2,000 words from a work of 500,000 words might be fair. It all depends on the circumstances.

To preserve the free flow of infor-mation, authors have more leeway in using material from factual works (scholarly, technical and scientific works) than to works of fancy such as novels, poems and plays. This is true especially where it’s necessary to use extensive quotations to ensure

the accuracy of the information con-veyed.

Rule 5: The Quality of the Ma-terial Used Is as Important as the Quantity

The more important the material is to the original work, the less likely your use of it will be considered a fair use.

In one famous case, The Nation magazine obtained a copy of Gerald Ford’s memoirs before their publica-tion. In the magazine’s article about the memoirs, only 300 words from Ford’s 200,000 word manuscript were quoted verbatim. The Supreme Court ruled this was not a fair use because the material quoted (deal-ing with the Nixon pardon) was the “heart of the book ... the most inter-esting and moving parts of the entire manuscript,” and that pre-publica-tion disclosure of this material would

cut into value or sales of the book.

Determining whether your intend-ed use of another author’s protected work constitutes a fair use is usually not difficult. It’s really just a matter of common sense. There is no more commonsensical definition of fair use than the golden rule: Take from someone else only what you wouldn’t mind someone taking from you.

Fair Use Rules1. Are you creating something new or just copying?2. Are you competing with the source you’re copying from?3. Giving the author credit doesn’t let you off the hook.4. The more you take, the less fair your use is likely to be5. The quality of the mate-rial used is as important as the quantity.


COMPLIANCE BRIEF

Ensuring Your Boot Camps and Meetings Comply With ADA

Question: Are info-marketers responsible for ensuring their boot camps and meetings comply with the “public accommodations” provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act?

Answer: Yes. This part of the ADA applies to info-marketers that rent meeting facilities, such as hotels or convention centers. Most info-mar-keters think ADA is an employment law, but Title III of the ADA requires “places of public accommodation” such as meeting facilities to not dis-criminate against persons with dis-abilities and to be accessible to these individuals. When info-marketers rent or lease meeting facilities, they are typically subject to this law.

The ADA requires your events to be physically accessible to individu-als with disabilities and that these individuals receive the benefits of the conference they attend. Accommoda-

tions such as wheelchair ramps and accessible restrooms may facilitate physical accessibility. Auxiliary aids and services may also be required to ensure access.

Info-marketers should ensure their hotel contracts spell out the duties under the ADA. The U.S. Depart-ment of Justice suggests that hotels should ensure their accommodations are physically accessible and that, upon request, info-marketers should provide auxiliary aids and services, such as Braille handouts for the blind and telecommunications devices or a sign language interpreter for the deaf. The law protects info-market-ers from having to provide these aids and services if they create an “undue burden.” However, the Department of Justice has already ruled that it is an ADA violation to deny a request for a sign language interpreter even if you only have one deaf individual

ADA Sample Statement

Here is a sample statement to add to your boot camp or meeting registration form:

Indicate any special assis-tance required in compliance with the Americans with Dis-abilities Act by [date of your choosing, probably 21 days or more in advance].

When you receive a request, un-less a U.S. Department of Justice employee would agree with you that the request is an “undue burden,” you have to provide the requested special assistance to comply with the ADA.

request the service.

Penalties for ADA violations may include monetary damages, civil penalties, court-ordered compliance measures and attorney’s fees.



The Glazer Kennedy Informa-tion Marketer of the Year, 2004 and 2005, seeks JV partners

for new U.S. venture ...Two time winner of the Glazer-

Kennedy Info-marketer of the Year award Nigel Botterill and his team based in Solihull, England, are expanding their incredibly success-ful community magazine business opportunity, My Mag, into the United States. The target market is pre-dominantly “stay-at-home moms.” They are very interested in talking to progressive thinkers with a “list” that includes stay-at-home moms, with a view to structuring possible joint ventures.

JOINT-VENTURE OPPORTUNITIES

It’s Time for You to “Cash In” BIG On Your “Toll Booth” Position …Editor’s Note: The following are joint venture opportunities available from Information Marketing Association members. The IMA provides this information as a FREE service to our members and does not endorse or approve any opportunity. Content is edited for space only. If you would like to submit a joint venture opportunity for the next IMA newsletter, you are welcome to email it to [email protected].

FINANCIAL HEALTH COACH

Financial Health Coach is a real estate coaching and training company that has a mountain

of testimonials from happy students making enormous checks, so there is a preponderance of “PROOF” to back up their powerful claims of riches, which makes it safe and easy for you to endorse to your list. As you will see in their pages of testimonials and success stories their clients range from: the stay at home mom, the I.T. guy that left his job, the U.S. Marine, teach-ers, attorneys, dentists, doctors, mort-gage brokers, real estate agents, business opportunity seekers, firemen, policemen, electricians, seasoned real estate investors, novice real estate investors, stock brokers,

computer geeks, professors, the waiter that just quit his/her job, information marketers, life coaches, real estate coaches, preachers, nurses, therapists, restaurant owners, carpet cleaners, the self employed, the hard working middle class, and the list goes on.

It is the perfect fit for any list whose subscribers are looking to make fast money and build wealth through real estate. Pre-Foreclosures and Short-Sales is a HOT topic guar-anteed to get anyone looking to make money very excited! To see more details on the upcoming Pre-Fore-closure Training Event go to www.ShortSaleSystem.com. Financial Health Coach has a proven, multi-step,

multi-media marketing campaign and sales system for converting leads into seminar buyers.

The current price-point for the upcoming event on December 4, 5 and 6 is $3,497.00 meaning you keep $1,748.50. So if just 25 clients from your list sign up, you’ll be getting a check for $43,712.50. Not bad for do-ing absolutely nothing! If you think your list would respond well and for more details on FHC’S Proven JV Marketing System™, please contact Maria directly at 239/353-2131 or [email protected]. You can always visit them at their coach-ing member site, www.FinancialHealth-Coach.com.

MY MAG OPPORTUNITY“My Mag has helped over 900

stay-at-home moms in the UK and Europe to work flexibly around their children, earn seriously good money and play a really important part in the development of their local com-munity,” explains Mike Giles, who is spearheading the American launch in Nigel’s team. “We know this is going to be huge in the States, and we’re looking to work with a small number of info-marketers with relevant lists as part of our roll out plan,” he adds.

“People don’t need knowledge of publishing” says Mike, “just a ton of enthusiasm and a willingness to talk with lots of people in their neigh-

borhood. We’ll provide them with everything else.”

Full information can be found at www.mymagusa.com. Anyone interest-ed can contact Mike at [email protected].


October 10 • 3:00 p.m., EDTBenchmarking and Money Making Teleseminar: How to Save Money Working With Low Cost Freelance VendorsAt 3:00 p.m., EDT, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

October 12-14 • ClevelandWealth Building Book Camp for RanchersRob Minton’s power packed session.888/845-9670, enter ID code 160, or 440/549-5945

October 19 • 11:00 a.m., EDTChris Mullins Off the Cuff TeleClinic: How to Defuse and Retain Disgruntled CustomersAt 11:00 a.m., EDT, dial 641/985-5005 and enter pass code 729568 #.(Go to www.GreatBottomLine.com to send us your complete contact information so you continue to receive information about our free programs.)

October 19 • 3:00 p.m., EDTJumpstart Teleseminar: Converting Leads Into CustomersAt 3:00 p.m., EDT, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

October 28-29 • Montreal, Quebec, CanadaTucker Fall MasterMind Group Meetingwww.dankennedysubprimemortgagemarketing.com

November 1 • AtlantaA-Z Information Marketing BluePrints Seminar With Bill Glazerwww.Info-Marketing.org/Summit.

November 2-4 • AtlantaGlazer-Kennedy Information Marketing Summitwww.Info-Marketing.org/Summit

November 4 • AtlantaInformation Marketing Association Members Only Gatheringwww.Info-Marketing.org/Gathering

November 7 • 3:00 p.m., ESTBenchmarking and Money Making Teleseminar: Nearly Pain Free Newsletter ProductionAt 3:00 p.m., EST, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

November 9-11 • Los AngelesAlexandria Brown’s “Online Success Blueprint Workshop”www.OnlineBlueprintWorkshop.net

November 16 • 3:00 p.m., ESTJumpstart Teleseminar: Risk Reversal Techniques to Drive Sales/Continuity Program SuccessAt 3:00 p.m., EST, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

December 4-6Financial Health Coaches Pre-foreclosure Marketing Conferencewww.FinancialHealthCoach.com

December 7 • 3:00 p.m., ESTBenchmarking and Money Making Teleseminar: Secrets of Success With Self Published BooksAt 3:00 p.m., EST, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

December 21 • 3:00 p.m., ESTJumpstart Teleseminar: Back-end Marketing and Creating Back-end ProductsAt 3:00 p.m., EST, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

January 18, 2007 • 3:00 p.m., ESTJumpstart Teleseminar: Optimizing Your Info-business for SuccessAt 3:00 p.m., EST, dial 512/597-6012 and enter pass code 726012#.

January 11-16, 2007 • Costa RicaScott’s Tucker’s 34th Annual Birthday Party!www.dankennedysubprimemortgagemarketing.com

All members of the Information Marketing Association are welcome to include items in the Info-marketing Industry Calendar. Send us a fax at 850/222-6002 including the dates, company name, meeting name, location and call to action for more information.

INFO-MARKETING INDUSTRY CALENDAR


PRESIDENT’S REPORT

We have officially been in business for six months now, and we have

implemented several new benefit programs. Let’s make sure you are taking full advantage.

Affordable Health Insurance Options for IMA Members

A growing number of people in the United States are uninsured. In 2005, almost 44 million Americans had no health insurance. Although many of those without insurance do have jobs, self-employed, part-time work-ers or low-wage earners find barri-ers to obtaining coverage—and less than half of all small companies offer health insurance to their employees.

Start saving today on your health insurance with an IMA Member Health Insurance Plan from Affinity Health Plans. For more details and your personal proposal, visit www.Info-Marketing.org/HealthInsurance.

Finally, a Merchant Services Provider That Appreciates Info-marketers

I’m sure you share my frustra-tion at family gatherings and when socializing with friends. They ask about your business, you explain the info-marketing business and they

Who Else Wants a Multimillion-dollar Info-marketing Business?Dan Kennedy, Bill Glazer and I created the Information Marketing Association to make you additional money.

still have no idea what you do for a living. Seems like no matter how thoroughly you explain your busi-ness, they can’t seem to understand. At this point, everyone I know has given up trying to make them under-stand. However, when vendors are involved—especially your payment processing vendors—it’s critical that they understand your business so they are able to help you.

One of the primary missions of the Information Marketing Associa-tion is to identify and train vendors on the benefits of working with our industry. At the top of that list is a merchant services provider that un-derstands our businesses, wants info-marketers as clients and will give us the best possible pricing.

Even if you are completely happy with your current merchant services provider, it will pay you to reconsider. Many providers quote you an attrac-tive discount rate. What they don’t tell you is that rate is only good for charges processed on Visa personal cards with the correct billing address and three-digit code. Other cards or the lack of verification information will cost you substantially more. That’s where your merchant services provider hides a lot of its markup.

Instead, you need a provider that shows you the costs for the 35 dif-

ferent transactions and quotes you a small markup on each of those rates. A handful of info-marketers that were beta-testers were able to save themselves from $30,000 to $80,000 a year in merchant processing fees.

For a free, no obligation evaluation of your current merchant services needs and your future opportunities, visit www.InfoMarketingMerchantSer-vices.com.

How Would You Like a Nation-wide Network of Salespeople Selling Your Information Prod-ucts Without You Doing Any Work? Now, Through Your IMA Membership, You Can.

The hardest part of the informa-tion marketing business is locating and selling new customers. Now, the IMA, together with Glazer-Kennedy Inner Circle, does that hard work for you.

Glazer-Kennedy Inner Circle cre-ated Independent Business Advisors across the country to sell member-ships, provide consulting and sell products within their communities.

One of the benefits of becoming an Independent Business Advisor is the opportunity to offer specialized information products to members through the IMA Product Showcase.


As a result, GKIC has done all of the hard work recruiting and training these advisors, but you get to benefit from increased sales without any ad-ditional work.

While the 50%/50% revenue shar-ing between you and the IMA will re-main the same, the IMA is setting up a complete store, and all transactions will be processed by the IMA. We will need product information, sales letters and your shipping contact. We’ll take care of everything else to get your product listed and sold through the IMA Product Showcase.

For more information visit www.Info-Marketing.org/ProductSales.

Fill Your Newsletters and Websites With Tons of Free Content

You have received a CD chockfull of articles you can use without charge and without searching. In addition to the terrific content provided by IMA members, Volume 2 featured articles from authors Denis Waitley, Chris Widener and Jim Rohn. All of these articles and more are available to you as a member of the IMA.

Recycle Your Content for Free Distribution

Have you ever saved up a bunch of cans and taken them down to the recycling plant in town? Pretty disap-pointing, isn’t it?

You don’t get anywhere near the amount of money that the work and aggravation of collecting and drag-ging those cans in there is worth.

The IMA has created a super-charged recycling program. This one is for your articles, special reports or even book chapters. Send them to the Information Marketing Associa-tion. We’ll pass them around to your fellow association members so they can publish your content with their members. All of it with your contact information and links back to you.

This way, you can take content that is old to your members, but new to others, and use it to generate new customers.

One problem, the deadline is Oc-tober 25. You have to act quickly.

Complete details are available at www.Info-Marketing.org/FreeContent.

Joint Venture SolicitionsFinally, another tool the Informa-

tion Marketing Association provides you each month is the Info-market-

ing Industry Calendar and member joint venture opportunities. Give us your event dates, product launch announcements and joint venture solicitations, and we’ll publicize them throughout the info-marketing industry.

There are even more exiting ben-efits coming online over the next couple of months. As you use your IMA membership let me know what it means to you. Feel free to send me an email at [email protected] or call to leave me a message on my Member Testimonial Line at 800/886-9705. Let me know how your IMA membership benefits you and what we can do to improve the association for you.

Documents

BEST BUSINESS PRACTICES OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL ... - …media.info-marketing.org/journal/200610_Journal.pdfinformation marketing business including a kit marketed to new customers,