What Does Every Successful Marketer Follow
A Plan
This may seem obvious to some people running any type of offline business, and yet people who decide they want to have an online business to earn some extra money often neglect this extremely important first step!
And can you blame them? Most new would be marketers and online entrepreneurs start out with what seems a simple search of ‘make money online’. They are then presented with 430,000,000 websites!
Can you imagine the confusion that already begins to reign as they click and click on so many sites?
What’s more with so many sites all crying out for attention of the new marketer, they all try to make it sound so easy and simple, at least that’s what I’ve found, and I’m sure
you’ve seen the same if you’ve gone down that route.
It makes the old saying ring true that “It’s a mine field out there!”
I don’t know if this has happened to you yet, but usually at this stage many will fall for the hyped up over priced ‘get rich quick schemes’ designed purely to extract maximum cash for the site owner from your wallet. They buy into the promises of overnight success, the pay us your money and do nothing pitch, and then can’t understand why nothing is coming their way as promised.
If they are lucky they wont fall for it too many more times (but from experience of talking to many newbies – they usually do)…. Until eventually they realise there is no overnight do nothing short cut.
That’s when most will either leave the internet completely, or start to look for serious help.
What stage are you at now?
Where ever people end up looking for help, at some point they begin to discover that there are people on the net earning real incomes, both part time and full time incomes.
The next move is usually to ‘have a dabble’ and try to find their way on their own, without listening to the false promises, but wandering around all over the place without focus.
If they’re lucky, they’ll make a few dollars every once in a while, always swapping and changing direction to what seems the next big thing, in the hope that ‘this will be it for them’!
let me ask you a question….
If you’re driving to your local shops – do you jump in the car and just follow whichever car is in front of you? Even if it’s heading in a different direction?
I know – silly question, of course you don’t.
You know exactly where you want to go and you already have a route planned in your mind before you even jump in the car!
What’s more, I’m sure you also have alternate routes available to you should anything interfere with your normal route?
Why – because you have planned the route, you know where you need to get to, and where you’re starting from, you’ve done the journey before so the ‘plan’ is already in your mind.
Lets look at this in business context.
Do you think any of the worlds successful business men and women just decide to start a new business and then set off? spending money advertising, gearing up to sell one product then thinking they’ll change to another because it looked a better idea one night, 3 weeks later doing something completely different.
Of course you don’t, and hey you’re smart enough to know that they would research and plan everything they do!
Well a business on the internet is no different than any other business. And I can tell you right now that the one of the most important Keys that Every Successful Marketer Follows is to PLAN what they are going to do and how they are going to go about it.
When you plan a journey that is unfamiliar to you, you would be advised to consult a map, or ask directions of someone who’s been there before. That would make sense wouldn’t it?
So if you’d like some help in planning how you’re going to build your internet income wouldn’t it make sense to ask for directions or follow someone who’s been there before. Someone who is already at where you want to arrive?
To sum up.
Make A Plan.
Get a map from someone who knows the route or follow someone who can lead you where you want to be. Decide where you want to go and make your plan with any help you can get.
Do you remember the saying….
If You’re Failing to Plan – Your Planning to Fail
Don’t Fail to Plan.
Tagged with: business planning • internet marketing planning • online business planning • planning your online business • successful online business
Filed under: Marketing Tips
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Well done here! You did hit the nail on its head! I absolutely agree with your statement that ” Make A Plan.Get a map from someone who knows the route or follow someone who can lead you where you want to be. Decide where you want to go and make your plan with any help you can get.” because planning is a very crucial part of your business life as it is where the decision making depends on. It can also make or break your business career, so its a must that you underwent a planning phase.
Hi Glyn,
As you know I followed a similar path to you. Buy all the crap and then realize it’s all a load of BS. Then you have to work out how these “Guru’s” are making millions online.
Then it dawns, they are selling a dream, nothing else. Then you realize you have been had and start again or give up.
I will stick to blogging, much nicer people.
Pete
Pete Carr´s last [type] ..To Post Or Not To Post – That Is The Question
I have been blogging for more than a year and up till now I have been finding the right path. So far I have been learning and implementing what I have learned.
Every pursuit of success takes time and patience.
Hi Glyn,
Great post and oh so very true. I had to finally put a buying freeze in place because I kept falling for the same old crap. Shame on me, you would think I had learned before then. That’s why those top income earners are at the top. They know how to write that sales copy that will draw us in. But at least I never gave up and knew there had to be a better way. Now I’m also a part of the FTM and am on the right path, finally! Can’t wait until this really kicks into high gear but at least I have a plan now.
Thanks for sharing this insightful post. Appreciate your honesty and the wake up call once again.
Adrienne
Adrienne´s last [type] ..Blog Commenting- My New Favorite Thing
I followed the same path also but the good thing was I was broke and cannot afford to participate in any of those programs. Then it hit me that the only way that would allow me to earn some money online was to follow the beaten path. And that was to find a job. Yes, finding work online. And that was the path I followed since then.
How To Freelance´s last [type] ..Freelancing At Odesk – My Frustrations
Hey Glyn,
If only we all knew this when first starting out, ha ha! The frustration we would of saved ourselves, as well as the time and money but for some reason this is a path every successful marketer goes through, and although we advice others so they don’t do the same, folk still continue to make this exact same mistake
. Just when will we learn. However, that’s the point! we have to learn from our own mistakes before we will make any serious money online and just like you said “once you have been through this you will either leave the internet marketing scene or you will look for some serious help”.
Kerry Russell
“If they’re lucky, they’ll make a few dollars every once in a while, always swapping and changing direction to what seems the next big thing, in the hope that ‘this will be it for them’!”
That was a total description of me until just a few months ago when I decided to get “coached”. The problem with most online businesses is that once they hook you, they throw you to the wolves, where as you say, without a plan, you will surely get eaten.
As with any business, you will fail if you don’t have some sort of business plan. I think that too many people unfamiliar with the Internet simply assume that the old adage “build it and they will come” is true.
Sadly, this is not the case. You’re absolutely right in that it takes time, hard work, patience and dedication to make it work. It’s absolutely possible to make money with a business online, but it takes just as much work as an offline business…
Duh-common sense…Don’t plan to fail.
This article is great especially since everything is starting to go viral and it’s best to hop on the bandwagon before we’re left behind. Online marketing is a key to build up your company up and with the way internet use is going, it can only increase. I love the pictures you chose for the article. “It’s not enough to just show up, you have to have a business plan” -and then the man with no sign. hahaha