Webmaker's Blog

In 2005, multi-billionaire media mogul, Rupert Murdoch, purchased MySpace for $580 million dollars. In regards to that purchase, he said, "Power is moving away from the old elite in our [print] industry - the editors, the chief executives and, let's face it, the proprietors."

What does that mean to you, as a Clickincome web entrepreneur? Everything. This is nothing less than the harbinger's cry, heralding a renaissance in mass media.

In the old days, as a marketer using Clickincome products or not, you could control your advertising message. You'd create your sales pitch, repeat it loud and often, and people would happily receive it. If a customer had a problem with the product, he might tell one or two friends. If they loved your product, they might tell some friends about that, too. There was no global way of sharing that message with anyone else.

Clickincome customer or not, those days are over.

Today, every day, your customers are in online forums, blogs, and networking sites telling the world about you. They're comparing notes, talking about the things they love and hate about your products, your website, and your company. They're talking about you on a global scale and you can't control what they're saying.

They're talking with their peers. They're talking with your prospective clients. Online social networking has taken control of your message. Anyone who wants to can see what everyone else is saying about you. Your sales messages, positioning, and your very brand, are no longer in your control.

The social networking tools the Internet now offers has changed everything.

Every word, every phrase, that these people are saying about your site can be found on the most important sites regarding your niche market. Every customer opinion, experience and perception, are being written in virtual stone for everyone to see. If people think your sales message was exaggerated, they'll say so. If they think your product is a waste of time or money, they'll say that, too. If they love your products and services, they'll say that, too, and other people will read it and make decisions based on it.

When commercial sites started appearing on the web (Web 1.0), including Clickincome hosted sites, it worked a lot like print and other traditional media - newspapers, magazines, radio, and TV. A message was crafted, delivered, and accepted.

Today (Web 2.0), with the development of social networking and communication models, customers and potential customers have been encouraged to enter into the conversation about you.

It constantly amazes me how many of my Clickincome clients, and other web entrepreneurs, don't know much about sites like MySpace and Facebook. Social media and Web 2.0 are changing the face of the Internet right before our eyes, but for some bizarre reason many marketers are unaware of it. It's as if they're blind to what's going on right in front of them.

If you haven't experienced these sites, I recommend you do so, right now. Wake up and smell the coffee, people! The internet is changing because of social media and social media is simply anything that uses the internet to facilitate conversation. It's using the "wisdom of the crowd" to connect information in a collaborative, and powerful, way.

If this isn't enough to convince you to get involved in social media, let's take a look at a 2007 study, done by the Online Publishers Association, on how people spend their time online.

* 5% of their time is spent searching at search engines.
* 16% of their time is spent buying and selling stuff (commerce).
* 45% of their time is spent on reading content.
* 34% of their time is spent in communication.
Because social media bridges the gap between content and communication, blurring the line between the creator and the consumer, 79% of online time is consuming content and talking about that content with others.

Blogs are great examples, of this. If I post a message to my blog, I'm posting content for my readers. Those readers can add their own comments. They can discuss that content in online forums. Other bloggers can link from their blogs to mine. Now my content has become communication.

After the communication dies down, the conversation itself becomes content. It's archived and available, in some form or another, for as long as the web exists.

The first step to understanding this phenomenon is to understand that media is no longer static, delivered through print or broadcast. Media is now delivered by humans.

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One of the biggest things I try and teach my Clickincome clients is the importance of getting attention to their web business. Getting attention for your website is a big deal. It's a very big deal. Without attention, you don't have visitors. Without visitors who trust you, you don't have buyers. No buyers, no sales. No sales, no money. Dead business.

This is true whether you're a Clickincome customer or not, by the way. Even if you're not a customer of Clickincome, you need to get people to pay attention to your site if you want your business to grow in any way.

Getting attention on the web can be rough, though, especially these days. Too many of my Clickincome clients come to us having this weird notion that if they just put up a website, visitors will flock to them like magic. It just doesn't work that way.

Let me give you an analogy. Think about your favorite grocery store. You walk in the front door and see hundreds of products, all vying for your attention. And that's just on the candy aisle. What if you could take a birds-eye view over the entire store? Now there are thousands of products, all wanting you to pay attention to them and buy them.

Got that image in your head? Good. Now, randomly pick one of those products. Guess what? That ONE product is just like your website. It's sitting in a sea of other products, all competing for the attention of the consumer.

If you think that's bad, guess what? The reality is that you've got it 373,333 times worse than that grocery store product. The average supermarket carries over 45,000 products. The Internet has around 16.8 billion web pages that you're competing with, and that's just the sites, written in English, that Google has indexed. That's 168 with eight zeros after it, in case you were wondering.

Now think about how many more pages are being added each and every day. Can you see why attention is so hard to get? It's basic supply and demand.

I don't tell you all of this to discourage you. I just want you to understand the value of attention. A major part of my job as a Clickincome mentor is to teach people how to get the attention they deserve. It can be done; you just have to know what you're up against.

Be thankful that you're on the Internet, and not in traditional media. TV, radio, newspapers and magazines are the big losers in this fight for attention. Let's look at it.

Television - One out of every three teenagers can't name the three major broadcast networks. Viewership is going down, while advertising costs are going up. 90% of homes that have TiVO or some other recording device skip all the commercials, making TV advertising a waste of time for those people. The number of commercials the average TV viewer remembers has gone down 70% in the last 25 years. Less than 18% of all TV ads actually generate enough sales to pay for themselves and generate profits for the company. That means that 82% of all TV ads are a waste of resources for the companies creating them.

Aren't you glad you're not in television?

Newspapers - 50% of newspapers readers are doing something else while they are reading the newspaper. The newspaper industry has downsized significantly, reducing its employed staff by more than 18% since 1990. Phil Myers, author of "The Vanishing Newspaper," estimates that traditional newspapers will no longer exist, due to market pressures, by 2043. During the 1990's adult newspaper readership dropped from 53% to 38%, and it's still dropping. With teens it's worse. Only 19% read the newspaper, and only half of those thought they were useful. According to the Newpaper Association of American, total circulation dropped by 1.3 million. Aren't you glad you're not in newspapers?

Magazines - 46% of magazine readers are doing something else at the time they're reading the magazine. Magazine readership is down world wide, and the trend shows no end in site. Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News and World Report are struggling to hold on to readers, turning away from print and toward online solutions just to try and keep readers.

Aren't you glad you're not in magazines?

Broadcast Radio - Because of new music delivery methods, such as mp3 players, Internet and satellite radio, traditional radio listeners have dropped by more than 2 million people since 1998. Satellite radio, on the other hand, has increased the number of its listeners by around 9 million.

Aren't you glad you're not in traditional radio?

This doesn't let you off the hook, by the way. You still have to advertise, and use the web to your best advantage. As long as you understand where you're at, where you're going, and how to do it, you can get the attention you want.

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When dealing with my clients at Clickincome, I often run into the problem of a presumed “status quo” for websites. Sure, there are guidelines and such for building websites, whether you’re a customer with Clickincome or not. Many of them assume that there are rules for building sites. Certainly there are laws that govern the way businesses are run in our country. You need to follow those rules or you pay inordinate amounts of money in fines or, worse, you go to jail.

When it comes to building websites, though, the rules are more flexible. To quote Captain Barbosa in Pirates of the Caribbean, “They’re more like guidelines.”

Yes, there are certain practices that work better than others, and I try to teach my Clickincome clients about best practices. Knowing what the “rules” are, though, means learning when to break them. That what “being different” means and being different can get your site noticed.

I don’t want you to get stupid for the sake of being different, mind you. Just because everyone else wears their shoes on their feet doesn’t mean I want to start tying them to my ears. Wearing shoes on my feet instead of tied to my ears has worked for me pretty well so far. Why change that around if it’s working for me? Being smart is definitely better than being stupid. Then again, a lot of people I’ve met are pretty stupid so, instead of falling in with that lot I think I’ll stay over her in smart land, thank you very much.

Being different is great, as long as it also means you’re more effective, and having more fun.

Let me give you an example of challenging the status quo. For years and years cooking eggs “over easy” has meant firing up a skillet on medium heat, melting butter in the pan, adding the egg and cooking on one side for a couple of minutes, and then gently turning the egg over to cook the other side. The trick, of course, is to not cook it so long on the other side that the yolk cooks solid. With eggs over easy, you want nice runny yolks.

When I do it this way, according to the “rules,” I’m lucky if the eggs turn out right. Usually I get a broken or overcooked yolk. You might have the same problem. Instead of doing it that way, the way “everyone else” does it, what if you turned off the heat after you added the egg, and then put a lid over the skillet? Then you could let the steam cook the top of the egg for a couple of minutes, just until the whites were done. Hey, this just might work (trust me, it does). Not only does it work but it works every time. Not only do you get better results but you avoid the problems inherent in flipping the egg over. Better results, less work.

When looking at successful web entrepreneurs the world over, the basic rule are pretty well uniform. Surprisingly so, and yet they are different from what the rest of the world is doing, or thinks it should do.

1. Retirement is not the goal.

Retirement planning is like life insurance. It’s preparation for a worst case scenario and is built on the idea that you hate what you’re doing. Retirement means being bored for the rest of your life.

2. Alternate periods of activity with periods of rest.

You can’t be “turned on” 100% of the time. Doing the same thing, day in and day out, for eight or more hours a day until you break or have enough cash to stop isn’t sustainable. Taking time for breaks and vacation isn’t being lazy, it’s survival.

3.Being busy is not the same as being productive.

Doing meaningless work is the same as not working at all. Acting on less important activities means you’re dedicating time to more important, and effective, ones. Don’t invent things to do just to keep busy. It just means you’re avoiding the important things.

4. The perfect time never comes.

It’s never the right time to have get married, or have children, or start a business. Never. Waiting until “someday” is a disease. If you want to do something, do it now or you never will.

5. It’s better to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.

As long as it won’t hurt someone around you, try it, and then justify it. Most obstacles in life try to stop you before you get started, not after you start moving.

6. Leverage your strengths.

If something is working for you, do it more and do it better. Focus more on the things you do well than trying to fix all the things you don’t do well.

7. Taken to excess, endeavors become their opposites.

Having too much of what you want often becomes what you don’t want. We are not interested in creating and excess of idle time. We are interested in increasing free time to do what you want to do, instead of what you have to do.

8. More money isn’t always the answer.

Money can be powerful, but it’s not the only answer to a problem. Using money as an excuse for everything distracts you from important self-examination and decision making.

9. Income is relative.

Having enough money to do what you want is not the same as having a lot of money. Making money always costs time, but time is more valuable.

10. Not all stress is bad.

There are two kinds of stress, that which harms you, and that which strengthens you. Jumping off your roof may kill you. Exercising may feel likes it’s killing you, but it’s actually strengthening you. If you avoid all stress, by staying on the couch in front of the TV instead of exercising, for example, it still weakens you. Doing the important, even if it’s uncomfortable, makes it easier for you to do it again.

 

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