Marketing with Alex

Hi everyone,

What a lovely day it is today, and what a great time it is to blog in the back of my garden first time whilst using my my 4 year old treasured laptop. You know, what, I’m not exactly an outgoing person and to be honest really, this building a relationships thing is really out of my comfort zone, well it was, until recently, where I discovered a methodology secret to successful networking.

Networking as you may know, is that it can be very easy or very hard from some. i.e. like myself , who tend to prefer to keep myself to a corner at a gathering, a seminar or a party. However with internet marketing, this barrier must be broken down, if we are to ever generate customers, discovering new JV partners, researching a market and even for launching a new product.

Additionally, networking isn’t just about getting people to be interested in you…oh..no…. it’s not like that anymore. The aim of networking is to build a network between the people you meet and other people you know.

For example… let’s say I meet this guy at this seminar and he’s called John (to keep things simple), I’ve been talking to him for a while using my 3 pronged attack method that I picked up (more on this later) and I found out that, he’s a website designer, and very good one too! He’s done numerous websites for all the IM gurus out there so he’s pretty special.

Now for some, they will just remember his name and what he does and that’s about it.

What we should be aiming to do instead is this: whilst your gathering information about what John does, you need to put you mindset into a mode where you thinking of “Hey I know a great web designer that should be able to help you out or, hey, I know just a person who require your web design services.

The reason you need to be in this mindset is so that, not only are you establishing links between people, but your also establishing a presence for yourself, a reputation for knowing the right people for the right job and by also pairing up these people who are looking for one another i.e. supply and demand (not love dating for those who were digressing), then these guys and gals will thank you for it.

Why?  You helped them out. You saved them having the hassle and time looking for a reputable individual or company, or an expertise which would have taken them hours, days, weeks, months to find, plus your also helping them create business and make money as well. 

With customers on the other hand, it’s about you helping them finding the solution to an problem that they have been actively seeking to solve.

Networking if done successfully and correctly, then the outcome is that  people will either love you, thank you, follow you or feel like they owe you a favor. Which is essentially what you need especially with potential and existing customers. And because they feel they owe you something, and you offering a product which solves another one of their problems, then they are more inclined in buying, downloading or listening to what you have to say pr offer.

Networking, it’s not really that hard, you just need to step out of your comfort zone and start chatting!

Until next time

Nigel

Hello my dear reader,

Today I like to discuss something that I know many would rather not discuss and that is mistakes.  As we all know that, when we make a mistake, mess up something bad style, we tend to feel… rather embarrassed, some of us even angry, or frustrated that we made a  wrong turn, a bad choice, a mis-calculation, which either made us look like a fool and will cost us both time and/or money?

Well, to be honest, I was in a similar situation not long ago, and reflecting back, it wasn’t that bad after all. The reason being that yes, you can learn from other’s mistakes, however to truly understand and learn from a mistake, as well as trying to not committing it again, we must actually have to experience it ourselves first hand.

So therefore, for those of us who have yet to reach the next step towards the red carpet of Internet Marketing Stardom Success,  just keep trying,  just keep making mistakes, and as like the Danish physicist and Nobel Prize Winner Neils Bohr famously said:

” An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made in a very narrow field.”

Therefore, everyone will become an expert of some sort, some day, we just need to commit and learn from all of the mistakes we will make. The only difference is how fast will be commit, learn and adapt from them? Will it be 1 month, 3 months, 6 months, a year? Or even a Year and a Half, like Alex, Maria and all the other internet marketing gurus and experts who are on the step above us?

So why do we hate mistakes? Well we don’t, it’s just that when we were little, as kids, our parents would tell us off and we would feel embarrassed in front of all of the other kids who were looking and giggling at us, and thus a possibility why we may have been temporarily mentally program and scarred to hate making mistakes.

But in fact, what we didn’t or may not have learnt or understand was that: when we were a little kid, our parents were simply offering us advice and helping us avoid committing the same act/mistakes again. The only thing they forgot to do was: teaching us how to learn and embrace mistakes, and how to to pick ourselves back up from it, but then again, it’s something I guess we have to learn as we mature and get older.

My question for all is: see if you can’t make a mistake today?
Nigel

I know I’ve already made one and that is I put this first over picking up my brother from college and now I’m 10 mins late!!! Ooops!!!

Hey Everyone,

Today is quite a special day for me as it marks another year of my life has just passed away. Whether one has said the past year has been wasted or not is another matter.

Not only this, it also marks another milestone that 1 month has passed and it’s now time for me to take some action with my life and steer it in the correct direction to the destination of where I wish to go.

Some will say that the journey to getting there is more important, and some will say that the arrival at the destination is more important.

To be honest, both are of equally important – reason being that: Everyone has their own aims, ambitions and paths to life and success, and no one individual has the same exact goals or ambitions. They may have similar goals or crossover from time to time, but ultimately, we are all seeking and pursuing on our own journey of life and unlocking our own personal secrets, and you know what? No one formula fits all.

Furthermore, the journey that we may or may not experience in regards to various aspects of daily life, really is determined by our own individual actions, decisions and whatever has been thrown at us.

We just need to learn how to manipulate these choices and options given to us, apply what we see fit for ourselves and then amalgamate both these variables to fit our individual needs and aims. And when we have done this, we just need to have faith and belief in our choices and decisions, and not let anything or doubt put us off track.

Well, that’s all for now today, nothing particularly special, just plain ranter?

Take care my dear friends and come back soon!!!
Nigel

Hey Everyone,

I’m not sure what to say other than that there has been so many comments, supportive emails, messages of best wishes, since I declared my departure, and that I was staggered, amazed and never realized that little old me (or should that be young could have possibly produce and caused such an impact on some.

Like I mentioned on Gary’s blog, I admit I was basically a fool, young, impatient, lack of long term vision, did not plan enough or properly, got completely sidetracked, did not focus hard enough and work my way on seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and reflect back on it.

I am awfully sorry to have confused you all. You are all been a wonderful, great, inspiring, supportive group of guys and gals who deserve every success in the world has to offer and more, that includes admiration, respect, riches, good health and may you all achieve the dream you want and more.

In fact, I would also like to take this opportunity to thanks those who have commented because, your comments has caused me to reflect on true core value of what I actually want, what I want to focus on instead, what I want to be associated with and to evaluate my actions and what I express more, before I commit myself to anything, and to also not be hindered by cynic factors and thoughts which have been clouding my actions, decisions and judgment.

For the past (almost) 3 month or so, it has been a roller coaster journey ride through the emotions and self discovery of my self and my life. Unfortunately I didn’t take in account of rest, relaxation, and reflection which would have helped balanced out the equation.

It’s now time to make things better and so I’m soon getting a change of scenery which I believe is critical for myself. I will now venture off and continue with my eBay business, and hopefully continue to make videos as well in my spare time.

I will also be reading books and watching movies that will hopefully inspire myself, take nature walks and drives, and listen to soothing music and turn off my mobile phone and limit the amount of time I spend on email, in the aim that I will slowly but surely, regain the zest for life and establish critical life goal posts.

If you ever have any video queries etc… please remember I’m still the video guy, so please do not hesitate to contact me.

All the best
Nigel

Hey Everyone,

Firstly, I like to take this opportunity to Thank all that have supported me over the past few months and since the coaching course has started, but unfortunately I have decided that I would bid farewell to you all as I have decided to leave. The reason I am quitting is that my focus and passion for this course seems to have deserted me and also, to me personally, it feels likes 100/0 rule rather than the 80/20 rules for me – that is 100% effort / 0% returns.

Prior to this and during the first few modules, I was always excited, raring to go and pretty much highly motivated, as some will have seen, however, now though, and I don’t want to sound rude or anything,  expecially yesterday’s webinar: module 6 and also module 5,  I somehow managed to nod off several occasions during both seminars – if you have read module 6 -part 1 you will know.

So, Why did I nod off on several occasions? I simply, really don’t know, but what I do know though is that, the course simply has dragged on longer than I expected which unfortunately meant that all my planning has been screwed up despite various re-planning and even those have to be thrown out of the window too.

Additionally, I don’t want to make it hard work for Alex, or everyone else either, especially since he did promise to everyone one of us in his sales video, that he would spend no matter how much time and effort necessary, in helping everyone one of us achieve online success. Not only, this, I personally do not want to hinder Alex, himself, or your success  in any way either, towards achieving and surpassing your $1 Millon dollars dreams & targets.

You are all a wonderful bunch of great guys and gals who are dedicating to helping others, and you all deserve every success you have and more. Most notable Alex, for venturing out his first coaching course and to create such great might and force in such a short space of time.

What I must mention is that my time with being in the fortunate 500, I do feel exceptional privileged to have met you all, however on the other hand I have felt overly stressed out and exhausted, and am under performing, hence another reason why I have decided to leave.

Although I am prematurely departing before graduation, I will still apply what Alex has taught me, I guess I will simply do it just at my own pace, maybe with a twist or something. Currently, for me there is something that doesn’t quite fit in, maybe I’m not ready for this, maybe I just need to take some time off, refresh my mind and re-plan, re-read the 4-Hour Work Week – and maybe then, I might be more adversed with tackling this online Internet Marketing Niche business chess game.

Good Luck to you all and all the best with your future endeavors and ventures
Nigel

PS: Remember the clue: “F Something with a 13 in it?” =  can you spot the clue?   Hint: Something beginning with the letter F contains the number 13 in it?

Answer: the month February begins with the Letter “F’ and it is something that contains a 13 in it i.e. the 13th day and what a great coincidence too: Friday 13th February 2009!!! aka Black Friday

cont….. from previous post:  “Module 6 – Triple Threat Affiliate!!! Part 1″

So yeah, where were we , oh yes, email marketing. Now after his 2 mins break with a battle to find Bonjela to soothe his ulcer, Alex progressed with email marketing and told us that we

“are on the way to a million dollar business”

Yeah right?

• For Alex Himself -  Definately YES!
• For some, YES TOO!!!
• For others, NOPE, or not yet, BUT  maybe one day soon!
  
• And for the few and far between, Blimin’ Highly Unlikely NOT- LOL!!!

But yeah, Alex then went on further and explain the two types of Aweber email contact – Auto Responders and Broadcast fucntions ,features, difference and how to st them up – it was certainly a Formidable (*pronouce it with French Accentand use the French meaning please*) effort demonstrating us his email marketing strategy and how he runs his Aweber side of his business.

Although I have to say now though, after last nights webinar session, I know as to why the communications dishes and signals between Alex along with the rest of the what is left of the so called fortunate 500 students, and I are so misaligned, thus the key reason why my blog  is hindered and not progressing as it should be, and why I should have listened to my gut instinct which has been telling me something I chose to ignore until recently, as well as why some students have left too.

It’s so damn pretty obvious, and I guess all of you, already knew what is was.  I guess, I should have known better, but then who cares, now that I’ve found the other half of my key to unlock my chosen door of destiny!

All the best
Nigel

PS: Have you found or already found your key yet?

Hey Everyone,

Hmmm…. Module 6 – Triple Threat affiliate? So what can I say?

Well first and foremost it was an information overload session and the coaching webinar session went beyond the 3 hour mark and I fell asleep twice during the webinar. Yes, that’s right I nodded off twice or more and no, it’s wasn’t boring, just my brain felt quite incompetent to handle the various processing streams of information although despite I nodded off on several occasions, I still managed to take a humoungous amount of notes.

Anyway, before I nod off again, how was module 6?

It began with Alex zentifying and deep brain cleansing with his philosophical pschological tactics and pre-priming us in the best receptive mode to focus on his lecture are it seemed to have the opposite effect for me and it all started off again with one of the numerous stories he would tell us about.

You see, Alex, was telling us how a French Guy named Matt Monsieur? Monsieur Matt? who he was attending a seminar with in San Francisco, who later when Alex met up again, year ago had built a business with blew past Alex’s. The point was that somehow fate and coincidence bought them back together again earlier this fornight when Alex was visiting Disneyland Florida. Apparently they parked in the same block and were 5 cars apart in the same row? That’s just freaky destiny or what?

Anyway, later continued to explain how both families then went around together having fun, enjoying life etc.. and that Walt Disney’s motto of:

“One Man’s dream“

was what Alex also believed and that he and Monsieur Matt went around Disneyland looking at various aspects from a marketing perspective, where they stumbled upon the 3 little pigs and stood there laughing like kids according to his missus.

This Alex, used effectively in describing how everyone should be building a business with strong foundations i.e. like the third little pig who built the house of bricks and mortar and kept the wolf out of bay. So after storytelling times of happy adventures across the pond, aka the Atlantic ocean, Alex Fastracked to reasons why everyone should be focusing on list building and list build only. Nothing else – just build the damn list, list, list!!!

But another few key ingredients included – you need to be able to create quality fresh content, traffic, and create a form or something that makes people attract to you or makes you likeable.(Sorry but that ain’t moi, everybody hates me even if I smile at them lol – guess I must have a mean face)

Furthermore, Alex then bombard us with his usual dictionary of random quotes collated from various influences, guros, experts and so called people with high authority along with all the 80/20 rules, about not holding back and re-plan, re-plan, re-plan.

Then there were the 3 phases:

• Build A List
• Write your own eBook
• Learn e-Mail Marketing

Well, yeah, also earning as your learning? Erm…is that even a good strategy?

Next for the remain hours or so , Alex kept recapping on what we had leanrt and that it was a simple process, just:

1. Create a good eBook
2. Create a squeeze page
3. Set up on Autopilot
4. Market the eBook
5. Build a list,

And finally keeping everything SIMPLE!!!!!

Oh and there was something about Results and Excuses and that

“You can be so close to success but not see how close you really are!”

Well how dose one define close, a eyelash away, a millimeter? Maybe even a centimeter, a meter or a kilometers?> Possibly even miles?

Then Alex progress to another story about the boy and the size and growth issue – well I think I fell asleep by then, why? My notes were slanted. But hey h, Alex soldiered on at blistering pace about again got his dictionary book of quote of which he picked up Vincent Thomas quote of

“Winners never quite, Quitters never Win!!!”

From there on, Alex concluded the first part of the webinar with the emphasis on that “Hell no, it’s not hard!” and to just get it going!!!

Right, cont…on next post!!!!

Hey Everyone

How are you all – hope you are all well.

So part 2 of my Masterplan, well, you see I’ve been plotting planning away for the whole of last night and early hours in the morning as well as a few hours earlier on my latest masterplan aka referred modestly as the 2009 plan.

Now what is my masterplan for 2009??? Well let’s just say “Misdirection”

Or to quote from Swordfish and John Travolta’s Line

“What the eyes sees, the brain believes”

and it’s so true especially with the AJ Course I’ve been on.

You see, my eyes are seeing what Alex Jeffreys is telling me about how to set up an online business, and so my conscious mode of my brain believes this, however the obnoixus side of my unconscious brain mode is telling me this is all a facade.

Why? I joing the course to learn how to make money, to learn how to set up an successful online business, to learn how to intiate and run a succesful business, and CERTAINLY NOT to be also sold products to and get bombarded with Giveaways, offers, and ebooks which were prepared a decade ago which, not only is so outdate, that a new rewrite is on the cards and begging to be given a new lease of life.

Oh and did I mentioned that because of the pace this course has been going at, a lot of basework, skills and important steps have been missed out. I’m not going to point them out blaringly obvious but some topics include:

How to find a niche products
How to actually do follow up messages,
How to know what are the best products to promote,
How to spot out trends,
How to utilise blog to full extent in related to promoted product and finally,
How to contact established JV’s and to develop your buisness and yourself
How to get people on board with you and literally agree with everything you say, even if your wearing yellow trousers and you’re telling them it’s black.

Anyway, did you know that the squeeze page given is bad, bad, bad. I mean the top IM Gurus are using videos and putting a aweber form below it to promote their products.

Oh and before I forget, Did Alex ever mentioned anything about laws, business requirements to setting up our own online business for example, somebody disagrees or complains about the guide your selling or about your information – what do you do then?

Do you a) put a disclaimer in your ebook to tell the buyer /reader that all information contain should be read with due caution and that to seek professional advice if you are unsure about anything before venturing out or B) Just get out there, try and be careful, despite your branding yourself and putting your name out there. Plus your risking your own name and face if everything falls apart or goes pants up – just like self-employed entrepreneurs.

Yes, taking risk is thrilling and that is one of the reasons out or many I’m sure, why people venture out and become their own boss, the other is they just hate 9-5 day jobs and feel that it’s better to be in control of your own life or alternatively have health or family commitments and problems which are of operandi higher priority.

What I’m trying to say is this, don’t let your eyes misdirect you and making your brain believe that this is the one hit wonder, for some this might be the one for them especially if they are the selected one for the groomed to be success route, but as you will know, it’s part of manipulation.

But then again, are you going to be one of those who has been leashed by the mentor, put blinkers on, a bit gag and been lead on a nose hook into a bull ring with a red flag and a rampage of thundering bulls ready ot grab more money of you?

Or have you or will you be of those who either escaped or never entered and have hidden in the background and are watching the rest of those who have been led into the bull ring i.e. the audience around the bull ring and enjoy taking the ridcule mock out of those led into the in the bullring blindedly and utter after the fight has finished “Oh, well just another coaching course – back to daily life again!”

So before I digressed again, what was my masterplan, well let’s just say you’ll find out sooner or later and by that time, if you are one of those who are gladly and love to be led into the bull ring with blinkers, and a bit gag…. well Best of Luck, if not, then Good Luck to you as well

Best Regards

PS: Misdirection, it’s like a love hate relationship or is it?

Hey Everyone,

Welcome to the latest video – it’s basically a dance video spoof I made from the various collection of http://www.xtranormal.com animation videos clips I have made on there.

Right here it is:

Ladies and Gentleman, I like to present you “The Alex Jeffreys Dance!!!” *If possible – view it in HQ mode on Youtube*

Here, I hope you all enjoyed viewing it and so do you want to know how I came about this idea or how I created it. Then please read on.

You see, at first, it was certainly unexpected as I was reviewing the previous introduction video again and was thinking what to talk about in the next video, when a bright idea came when the credits were rolling.

How about a dance spoof video since I had made so many different test version. And so I set about making them.

So how did I first start, well previously I signed up for an account at
Xtranormal.com – and it’s basically an online based cartoon generating maker – think animoto and your part way there except the cartoons are already pre-made for you.

All you have to do is select a pre-mdae scene, choose whether you want 1 or two character in you movie, select your actor/actress out of the 30 odd characters availiable ( they all have different styles fo hair, clothes, make up, occupation etc…) Once done, you start typing what you want your characters to say, inserts any actions, expressions etc.. you want.

Oh and did I mention there is an auto camera angle perspective wizard which automatically adjust your camera angles on your character It’s certainly useful for those who don’t want to fiddle about, for me though, it takes aways some of the action, hence I prefer to manuallly set the different camera angles.

Once done, I sent them through the online based cartoon video based generating “they call it rehearsal” engine, (technical term should be rendering/processing) and then voila, video is done and I uploaded them to youtube.

I repeated these steps numerous time to get videos of the different characters.

Now after I had got all my videos rendered and processed, what I did instead was downloaded my new videos using the wonderful Firefox plugin Video DownloadHelper , once done, I sent them through a free program called WinFF which is wonderful tool for converting different video types.

Now, here’s the “what some would call hard but I can fun” part, and that is editing. It took me just over 10 hours, several Windows Movie Maker crashes and a 2 PC restarts to get the video sorted. I blame myself for not updating with Technology as I’m running an 4 year old machine, a 2.8Ghz P4 with HT disabled. Reason being my pc doesn’t like HT enabled, and fans go on full blast tornado mode which sorta deafens my ears.

Anyway, so I imported all the clips into Windows Movie Maker – this took like 3 hours to import and so I took this time to grab something to eat, watched a bit of TV which the first thing I saw was Channel 4 New with Barack Obama giving his Speech and coverage of the whitehouse parade etc.. with John Snow interviewing and promoting his blog as well – lol.

Anyway after 3 hours, I came back and started to edit the movie by arranging the clips in order, followed by snipping ,trimming, adjusting volume, syncing music etc.. to it – it didn’t take long – just an hour in total and then trouble struck!!!

My PC decided not to play any .WAV files, apparently a codec problem with Windows Media Player – bummer – I reallly didn’t know what happened as yesterday i.e. day before making dance video, it was playing all fine – I think it might be the new update patch – anyway, so I saved it and hopped on to my little brother machine, a vista based, quad core powerhouse and imported to Windows Movie Maker and hit hte publish movie button- It was great, it worked however I couldn’t view the finished product. Bummer!!!

So I had to copy the video onto a memory stick and imported it back onto my XP machine and wahey it worked and I viewed it numerous times and went back to Windows Movie maker to fine tune things – and so back and forth for an hour or so before I finally thought- that’s enough today, upload it to Youtube tommorow.

And so that brings it earlier today – da da!!! Launch day- touch wood, Youtube was working cool, video got uploaded about 30 minutes due to large file size and now let’s just see if it might be the next big hit – lol.

Right, like I said earlier on, I hope you have enjoy watching and I love to hear your comments and feedback about it… hehe

Now if you would like to make you own cartoon base video – check out :

www.xtranormal.com
(I suggest that you visit the site during out of day hours/work hours as the site is very busy and sometimes you could be staring at the blank video making wizard screen for more than 30 minutes.

The music was bought from an Royalty Free Music company called Dance Midi Samples which can be found at http://www.dancemidisamples.com/

Only issue, is you need some form of music program to arrange the midi/wav files to create a track. I used Fruity Loops.

Right, I best leave you all to it now and sorry about the long post but I thought it would best if I shared with you my experience and knowledge on how I created it.

Oh and yes although the video took a lot of hard work, time and effort to get it done, overall it was great fun making it and so I too have hope to inspire you to have perserverance even when things don’t go according to plan, as the end result will be worth it!!!

Take care and all the best
Nigel