I'm not sure if anyone else has noticed this, but almost everything is "Shit-ly" nowadays. Leaf-ly, Marked-ly, whatever-ly....but why?
I don't think it makes me care about the product more. I thought it was really good with bit-ly. the name is short and makes you think of shortened links. the URL (bit.ly) makes sense. Why on god's green earth would I care about impressionly, or whatever-ly? I don't get it.
I feel this is similar to the iPod phenomenon. People see something do really, really well like the iPod, and then they see Apple line extend that idea to their other products. Because Apple is an army of wizards, they can line extend and not annihilate themselves from a PR standpoint. Other shitty companies try to follow suit and fail. That's dumb.
If I had to make a product or service (SaaS probably) that would end in "ly" today, I think it would be "Stop-ly" because people would laugh at the name. or maybe they wouldn't. I don't know. I still think it would be good.
What would the product do? I don't know. Maybe it would help people stop smoking. maybe it would help people stop any bad habits. and it could have a social piece as well. That would be coolish...ly
ho boy.
I was just on prodcthunt and I saw a new app called "Highly" that is an easy highlighter app for your iPhone. dude it's a dumb idea and a dumb name. My phone totally has a highlighting applet built into the firmware. Kindle has an incredible social highlighting system build into its app. No. Bigger and better companies have already done it. Nobody cares. Radda.
This person is relying entirely on the catchiness of the name to build an audience. I don't think this is how it should go. He didn't solve a problem, he didn't fill a need, he just built an app with a catchy name that sounds slightly weed-related and thinks he'll make money. The sad thing is that he might.
Solve problems people. Don't make them.
Thursday, July 21, 2016
Tuesday, July 19, 2016
7/19
I feel shitty today. I didn't ge tthe pay I wanted at my job, and my guest webinar has been cancelled. I haven't gotten any guest posts in months, and I need to write more content. That's where I stand.
so that's what I need to do. I need to find a topic for small business owners that will make sense to them, and I need to write a newsletter about it. I also want to make a video. so I need to do that tonight. Fuck.
I have finally realized that wen I feel bad, its because I need to write. I never in my life thought I would be a writer, but I apparnetly am. I haven't ever been a person who sat down and wrote until... well until I started to. It's crazy. I 've always liked visual art, I drew for years, I played guitar and piano for about a decade...andnow I'm writing. and it feels like my art. and I love it.
I think that i want to write a novel, but I'm afraid i'll waste time if I do. This is of course bullshit (resistance) because I should be spending my time writing a novel. I should be spending my time doing things that feel right. So maybe I will.
I'm happy that I found writing. I really enjoy it. I think that wha tI need to write about is finding your medium for marketing. I think a lot of people see "blogs" or "youtube channels" and forget that they're all doing the same thing: creating a marketing platform that people want to watch. That's what's i'mportant.
so that's what I need to do. I need to find a topic for small business owners that will make sense to them, and I need to write a newsletter about it. I also want to make a video. so I need to do that tonight. Fuck.
I have finally realized that wen I feel bad, its because I need to write. I never in my life thought I would be a writer, but I apparnetly am. I haven't ever been a person who sat down and wrote until... well until I started to. It's crazy. I 've always liked visual art, I drew for years, I played guitar and piano for about a decade...andnow I'm writing. and it feels like my art. and I love it.
I think that i want to write a novel, but I'm afraid i'll waste time if I do. This is of course bullshit (resistance) because I should be spending my time writing a novel. I should be spending my time doing things that feel right. So maybe I will.
I'm happy that I found writing. I really enjoy it. I think that wha tI need to write about is finding your medium for marketing. I think a lot of people see "blogs" or "youtube channels" and forget that they're all doing the same thing: creating a marketing platform that people want to watch. That's what's i'mportant.
Monday, July 18, 2016
7/18
I need to write a newsletter for my list. I don't know what I want ot write about. I thinki might write about cars instead and start a new company lol. no I don't know I'm actually thinking about it because I'm watching roadkill in the background, and It's not helping me get any ideas. They're working on a wheely-iing dump truck... I just want to finish my porsche and my Saab.
I" think that I need to write about will be fun, interesting, and will teach my list somehting new every week. I'm going to release this no Friday.
I think some of the things that I need to write will be about something that will have great content. I need to research something and get information about it, but I don't know what people are looking for.
That's what I'll do: I'll go dig around some forums and see what people are asking about. from there I'll get a better idea of what people want to learn. I tink that Small business and entrepreneur on reddit will be the best places to start. I'll do some permission marketing and answer some questions, and from there I'll know exatly what to write after we do that for the week.
WHOO!
The attic is almost ifnished too, which is awesome. That means that there will be an extra 500 sft in the house, and soon the garage will be usable as well. I'm building my custom door cards downstairs and they're coming a long really well also. I'm looking forward to having a really sick hotrod Porsche.
I" think that I need to write about will be fun, interesting, and will teach my list somehting new every week. I'm going to release this no Friday.
I think some of the things that I need to write will be about something that will have great content. I need to research something and get information about it, but I don't know what people are looking for.
That's what I'll do: I'll go dig around some forums and see what people are asking about. from there I'll get a better idea of what people want to learn. I tink that Small business and entrepreneur on reddit will be the best places to start. I'll do some permission marketing and answer some questions, and from there I'll know exatly what to write after we do that for the week.
WHOO!
The attic is almost ifnished too, which is awesome. That means that there will be an extra 500 sft in the house, and soon the garage will be usable as well. I'm building my custom door cards downstairs and they're coming a long really well also. I'm looking forward to having a really sick hotrod Porsche.
Sunday, May 1, 2016
5/1
May First, and I'm still slamming on my course here. I'm adding about 20 hours of video how-tos, and a ton of extras to the course as well now. I want it to be an incredible resource for small business owners.
It's funny: I've been listening to and reading a lot of books about authors as they "talk shop" and a lot of them talk about "having a book inside of them" and "needing to get it out" This part of my work feels like that. It's like a sickness: I have this course, and this business model inside of me, and I won't feel better until it's out of me, and working. I want this to work.
Meditation continues. I'm trying more advanced techniques like visualization, and it's really great to be able to force your brain to focus specifically on something while you're working. It does really pour over to real life. I would recommend anyone to give Headspace a try and get through the first 30 days. It will change the way you work and live.
Stanley is excited to move in here, and to go to college. He's coming up more weekends than not, now, really just to chill out. It's good for all of us, as his presence seems to make us all slow down a little bit, even Sophia. These weekends have been extremely mellow, which has been needed. Stef and I have both been working day in and day out on our businesses: Stef her Simple Spreadsheet business for multi-level marketers, and her bookkeeping business, me on my course, and building my brand. I'm still working for the time being as well, but requests for my services have come in on on a weekly basis now, so I'm fairly sure that even if I got fired tomorrow I could almost immediately replace my income with client work while I finished the course. It is a nice feeling.
I am starting to picture the course in its entirety in my mind, and I can see it being an incredible resource for people. I'm having Stef do each day with me, and I'm recording it, which I think adds a shit ton of value, as she has literally no experience in online marketing. Plus, it gives us a space of time to work on her business as well, and market it. She's getting leads, and also clients. She's excited. It'll be a lot of work.
We're not afraid of hard work, but I think after this we really need to slow down for a time. We've been ruthlessly building our careers/business for years now...really nonstop since the year before Sophia was born, and she's 4 now. We are exhausted and ready for our first Mini-retirement. I think we're going to do an RV trip around the four corners of north America. That's what I want to do. I think we may just...be for a few months at home, and then decide from there, though. However, it think it'll be hard to not work if we're just at home. I don't really know. I just want to focus on building our remote work lifestyles for now... we're closer than we ever have been.
Much work to be done, but we'll get there.
It's funny: I've been listening to and reading a lot of books about authors as they "talk shop" and a lot of them talk about "having a book inside of them" and "needing to get it out" This part of my work feels like that. It's like a sickness: I have this course, and this business model inside of me, and I won't feel better until it's out of me, and working. I want this to work.
Meditation continues. I'm trying more advanced techniques like visualization, and it's really great to be able to force your brain to focus specifically on something while you're working. It does really pour over to real life. I would recommend anyone to give Headspace a try and get through the first 30 days. It will change the way you work and live.
Stanley is excited to move in here, and to go to college. He's coming up more weekends than not, now, really just to chill out. It's good for all of us, as his presence seems to make us all slow down a little bit, even Sophia. These weekends have been extremely mellow, which has been needed. Stef and I have both been working day in and day out on our businesses: Stef her Simple Spreadsheet business for multi-level marketers, and her bookkeeping business, me on my course, and building my brand. I'm still working for the time being as well, but requests for my services have come in on on a weekly basis now, so I'm fairly sure that even if I got fired tomorrow I could almost immediately replace my income with client work while I finished the course. It is a nice feeling.
I am starting to picture the course in its entirety in my mind, and I can see it being an incredible resource for people. I'm having Stef do each day with me, and I'm recording it, which I think adds a shit ton of value, as she has literally no experience in online marketing. Plus, it gives us a space of time to work on her business as well, and market it. She's getting leads, and also clients. She's excited. It'll be a lot of work.
We're not afraid of hard work, but I think after this we really need to slow down for a time. We've been ruthlessly building our careers/business for years now...really nonstop since the year before Sophia was born, and she's 4 now. We are exhausted and ready for our first Mini-retirement. I think we're going to do an RV trip around the four corners of north America. That's what I want to do. I think we may just...be for a few months at home, and then decide from there, though. However, it think it'll be hard to not work if we're just at home. I don't really know. I just want to focus on building our remote work lifestyles for now... we're closer than we ever have been.
Much work to be done, but we'll get there.
Saturday, April 16, 2016
4/16
So stef is starting a business as well. she wants to do bbokkeeping, which I think is a great idea. however we got in a fight this morning when she was working on an email for the copmany, and asked for my help. I was not too amused as she told me my writing style sucked and that it was terrible. I get paid for this so I was pissed. I'm not sure if I'm going to offer my help anymore.
Second, I was planning on working all morning while she slept, and instead she calle dme upstairs at 7am and had me work on her email for 2 hours, and then threw a fit because it was "terrible" I spent the entire time explaining to her WHY the email is a different pitch than the craigslist ad (she had copy and pasted her craigslist ad into an email) and how someone on craigslist is actually LOOKING for a bookkeeper, and thus they're reading your ad, whereas an email is a "cold call" Emails like this should be treated as if you're knocking on someone's front door an interrupting dinner. That's the key statement I should ahve started with, it probably would have saved me an hour of bullshit.
woosah, that now over, I'm building a marketing plan for the course, and starting to setup the course structure on the website so that I can test the user experience on a few people, and probably give out some free courses for testimonials and such. I'm hoping to give out 5-10 freebies to some established companies with no websites and see how it works out for them. I'm still working on how to do this so that they're motivated to do the course, and do it well... perhaps I do actually still need to charge for it? maybe a 99$ price point with a mandatory testimonial at the end? not sure....
Anyway, I'm working on that stuff, and I'm also working on stef's business, which I think can also give her that freedom she's looking for. Jon Provost has already emailed some contacts he has and they're all very interested in referring people to the company, as they constantly get asked who to use for a bokkeeper and nobody knows of a good reliable one they can focus on. I told stef that for referrals like this, people love to "say" they'll give referrals but they never fucking do, so you need to write them an email script to use to get rid of the awkwardness. I'll be doing that as well.
I have been developing a marketing testing spreadsheet for my business as well, and I've been trying to get stef to do the same. Getting a marketing plan in place from day one ensures that you're either getting more business, or you're throwing away time wasting bullshit as soon as humanly possible, because you're testing everything. Email doesn't work? throw it out. Paper ad didn't work? throw it out. etcetc. I'm hoping to get her to that point soon... or I might just do it. I want to ensure her success so I think I'm going to have to take over the marketing in a wholesale manner, but still make it look like "her idea" from soup to nuts. oy vey.
Starsjas took sophia for a lseepover last night! so we went to bed at 930! hooray! It was nice since I get up at 6, so I'm also enjoying the silence now as there is no bouncing child running around the house making it more of a shitshow than it already is. The house is actually, completely clean for once.
I'm going to go write a new blog post now.
Second, I was planning on working all morning while she slept, and instead she calle dme upstairs at 7am and had me work on her email for 2 hours, and then threw a fit because it was "terrible" I spent the entire time explaining to her WHY the email is a different pitch than the craigslist ad (she had copy and pasted her craigslist ad into an email) and how someone on craigslist is actually LOOKING for a bookkeeper, and thus they're reading your ad, whereas an email is a "cold call" Emails like this should be treated as if you're knocking on someone's front door an interrupting dinner. That's the key statement I should ahve started with, it probably would have saved me an hour of bullshit.
woosah, that now over, I'm building a marketing plan for the course, and starting to setup the course structure on the website so that I can test the user experience on a few people, and probably give out some free courses for testimonials and such. I'm hoping to give out 5-10 freebies to some established companies with no websites and see how it works out for them. I'm still working on how to do this so that they're motivated to do the course, and do it well... perhaps I do actually still need to charge for it? maybe a 99$ price point with a mandatory testimonial at the end? not sure....
Anyway, I'm working on that stuff, and I'm also working on stef's business, which I think can also give her that freedom she's looking for. Jon Provost has already emailed some contacts he has and they're all very interested in referring people to the company, as they constantly get asked who to use for a bokkeeper and nobody knows of a good reliable one they can focus on. I told stef that for referrals like this, people love to "say" they'll give referrals but they never fucking do, so you need to write them an email script to use to get rid of the awkwardness. I'll be doing that as well.
I have been developing a marketing testing spreadsheet for my business as well, and I've been trying to get stef to do the same. Getting a marketing plan in place from day one ensures that you're either getting more business, or you're throwing away time wasting bullshit as soon as humanly possible, because you're testing everything. Email doesn't work? throw it out. Paper ad didn't work? throw it out. etcetc. I'm hoping to get her to that point soon... or I might just do it. I want to ensure her success so I think I'm going to have to take over the marketing in a wholesale manner, but still make it look like "her idea" from soup to nuts. oy vey.
Starsjas took sophia for a lseepover last night! so we went to bed at 930! hooray! It was nice since I get up at 6, so I'm also enjoying the silence now as there is no bouncing child running around the house making it more of a shitshow than it already is. The house is actually, completely clean for once.
I'm going to go write a new blog post now.
Tuesday, April 12, 2016
4/12
As I said yesterday before I passed out, the course page tested successfully. I'm happy as hell about that. I'm also glad that I'm going to be able to move on to creation. Stef wants to help, which is a huge weight off my shoulders as I'm going to be able to pass off a lot of the detail work to her and expodite the course development. I'm hoping to launch the course sometime in Mid May, and see how it goes.
I also found my speed reading course I made years ago! and i sold like 5 copies of haha. I'm going to develop a quick and dirty sales page for that, revamp the course, and sell that for $100 bucks or so as well. now that I get how marketing works online this stuff seems a lot easier.
I need to sleep more, or rest more or something, though. I'm getting very tired toward the end of each week, and its hard for me to keep up with all the work I'm doing. Ideally I would find some more tasks to eliminate from my workflow, but I don't think I can eliminate much more. I've been meditationg for 23 days straight now, and that has been a huge help. the headspace app is wonderful. it's totally worth the $7 a month.
I'm hoping to start to sell this course in some larger capacity in June, and move onto larger marketing venues as well. I've already developed a basic marketing plan that looks as such:
Google PPC
Bing PPC
Yahoo PPC
Banner Ads on trade forums
Magazine Ads in Trade Magazines for Tradesmen and small business owners
Guest Posting and blogging on trade based sites.
Doing basic conversion math, If I can expose this idea to about 1.5 million people a month, it will convert into the number of sales I want to get. (about 30 a month) this is super rechable based on my testing, so I'm hoping that as i expand toward these other marketing venues that I'll actually see some real revenue growth.
Besides that: the house was filthy, now it is clean, and I am tired. Full Lesson plan and course outline work will start tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow.
I also found my speed reading course I made years ago! and i sold like 5 copies of haha. I'm going to develop a quick and dirty sales page for that, revamp the course, and sell that for $100 bucks or so as well. now that I get how marketing works online this stuff seems a lot easier.
I need to sleep more, or rest more or something, though. I'm getting very tired toward the end of each week, and its hard for me to keep up with all the work I'm doing. Ideally I would find some more tasks to eliminate from my workflow, but I don't think I can eliminate much more. I've been meditationg for 23 days straight now, and that has been a huge help. the headspace app is wonderful. it's totally worth the $7 a month.
I'm hoping to start to sell this course in some larger capacity in June, and move onto larger marketing venues as well. I've already developed a basic marketing plan that looks as such:
Google PPC
Bing PPC
Yahoo PPC
Banner Ads on trade forums
Magazine Ads in Trade Magazines for Tradesmen and small business owners
Guest Posting and blogging on trade based sites.
Doing basic conversion math, If I can expose this idea to about 1.5 million people a month, it will convert into the number of sales I want to get. (about 30 a month) this is super rechable based on my testing, so I'm hoping that as i expand toward these other marketing venues that I'll actually see some real revenue growth.
Besides that: the house was filthy, now it is clean, and I am tired. Full Lesson plan and course outline work will start tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow.
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
4/6
Successful testing of course page on day one! lol. That is reassuring. I had a TERRIBLE scare when I setup my PPC campaign wrong and my CPC jumped from .18 to $4.50. I thought that I had gotten priced out of the campaign... but fortunately It was only because of the way Google indexed a single page on my site, so I fixed it and it went right back to the same price as before. So far the conversion rate on visitors is about 5%, which is....5 times higher than i expected. I'm hoping to continue to grow the email list, add some analytics to the sales page, and...just keep things like they are. I'll continue to tweak via A/B testing as I see what works and what doesn't.
Work is borring. I've gotten too good at my job. my boss now asks me for advice on how to do her job...which is never a good sign. Its just ridiculous at this point that they haven't hired me. I don't particularly care anyway as I'm just using it as a paycheck as I continue to build muse businesses. I think it's finally clicked: how to do things like this. I've been way too focused on the wrong things, and now that I'm catching on its really starting to take shape... I'm excited.
Ketogenic diet is going excellent. I've been on it for 3 fuul weeks now, and I'm starting my 4th. I've lost weight, I feel far less panicked, and I can.... I swear I can feel it doing great things for my liver. I feel like before I was very swollen in that area, and now it feels great.
I've been meditating almost every day, which feels amazing. I'm glad that I've added that back into my life as a constant now. Strangely enough, I still haven't really added exercise in the sense that I consider it back into my regimen. I'm really taking it easy on my body as it gets used to KEtosis, and then I'm going to add in small workouts to continually draw down glycogen as I get to that point. I think I'm close, but I have no desire to do so at the moment.
I have several other ideas for muse businesses as well, and I'm planning on testing all of them. However, if this first ont tests viably over the next 5 days then I'm going to go full steam ahead on developing the course and aim for the same May 1 launch date. I'm hoping to build a really good course and sell it pretty constantly for a long, long time.
Mom, its weird that you get these via email, but oh well. Enjoy. Love you.
Work is borring. I've gotten too good at my job. my boss now asks me for advice on how to do her job...which is never a good sign. Its just ridiculous at this point that they haven't hired me. I don't particularly care anyway as I'm just using it as a paycheck as I continue to build muse businesses. I think it's finally clicked: how to do things like this. I've been way too focused on the wrong things, and now that I'm catching on its really starting to take shape... I'm excited.
Ketogenic diet is going excellent. I've been on it for 3 fuul weeks now, and I'm starting my 4th. I've lost weight, I feel far less panicked, and I can.... I swear I can feel it doing great things for my liver. I feel like before I was very swollen in that area, and now it feels great.
I've been meditating almost every day, which feels amazing. I'm glad that I've added that back into my life as a constant now. Strangely enough, I still haven't really added exercise in the sense that I consider it back into my regimen. I'm really taking it easy on my body as it gets used to KEtosis, and then I'm going to add in small workouts to continually draw down glycogen as I get to that point. I think I'm close, but I have no desire to do so at the moment.
I have several other ideas for muse businesses as well, and I'm planning on testing all of them. However, if this first ont tests viably over the next 5 days then I'm going to go full steam ahead on developing the course and aim for the same May 1 launch date. I'm hoping to build a really good course and sell it pretty constantly for a long, long time.
Mom, its weird that you get these via email, but oh well. Enjoy. Love you.
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