Part Four Case Study

Part Four Mark Start-Up Internet Business (December 2004 Call)

Here's another live two-part training call that teaches you how to discover hidden marketing assets

Here's another training call I conducted with a Mr. Mark Mysack. Please download the opportunity analysis worksheet and follow along. Mark called looking for marketing advice on his new internet start-up business. This is only the fourth time I have conducted an opportunity analysis. Your learning as I am learning. Notice how I am closing all the way through the call. This is something I was not doing in the first two calls. Each call is getting easier and easer. My confidence in conducting the opportunity analysis is getting stronger. Stick with me on this call to the end even though you may get a little lost with the details of his business. His business is not the important aspect of the call. It's how to interview the prospect. I did this call with Mark for two reason. One, he agreed to let me record the call so I could show you how to do another opportunity analysis. Two, I needed more practice. If you think you are going to be able to do one of these calls and feel comfortable the first time, you are mistaken. You have to practice this interview several times before you get comfortable with it. You have to really understand the HMA system and how it can help a business grow. But when you understand this interview process like the back of your hand, the world is yours. Imagine the possibilities that await you when you have the confidence to interview any business and that you can show that business all the money he is missing out by not having you as his marketing consultant. I hope this interview will answer the question "can I do this?" Feel free to call or e-mail for more information. michael@michaelsenoff.com

Mark: I can see where not doing the unique selling proposition is slowing down the time to bring in the money quick. Take care of this first; you’ll make those other things happen quicker.

[Music]

Michael: Hi, this is Michael Senoff with www.hardtofindseminars.com . Here’s another interview, or what we call an opportunity analysis. It’s with a gentleman named Mark Myszak. Mark contacted me looking for help with his start up business. Now, what we teach in the HMA Consulting business is work with clients who have a customer base. But there’s going to be times when you have people contact you who are in the start-up phase and you never want to ignore those people because many times there are contingency opportunities within those businesses. So, I ___ and took Mark through the opportunity analysis worksheet and even though he was still a start-up, we could uncover many hidden marketing assets in his business. This is another example of how to get clients that regardless start-up or set-up, this opportunity analysis interview, which lasted about an hour, will show you how to get clients, and you’ll follow along when you become an HMA consultant with the opportunity analysis worksheet. With this particular interview, I want you to pay attention to a few things. Number one, it may be a little confusing of exactly what Mark is doing, but don’t let that stop you. Keep listening to the very end because you will see without a doubt how effective this opportunity analysis is. By the end of this conversation, you will hear Mark identifying with all of the things we talked about, specifically the USP. Also, keep in mind, after I describe each step of this system, notice how I’m always closing. I ask him after each step, do you see how this can make you more money. So, it’s a pre-closing question and you will hear him say in every case, yes, I see it. So, what we call that is ABC, always be closing through this opportunity analysis. This opportunity analysis is a sales presentation. And then you will see at the end how this potential client is closed without a doubt. Even though you’re working with a start-up and they may not have money, spending the hour on the phone with them positions you as the expert and when it’s time, when he makes some money, you can bet that he’ll call you. So, stick with this recording all the way to the end. There’s a lot of lessons to be learned. Enjoy.

All right, are you ready to get started?

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: Let’s start with some basic information that I usually fill out. I have a little form that I follow. It’s kind of like a cheat-sheet and on the front I always like to put the business name. Do you have a business name now?

Mark: It’s under D Marie Enterprises.

Michael: Give me the spelling of your full name.

Mark: Mark Myszak.

Michael: What’s your address?

Mark: 6545 Alta Drive, Las Vegas, NV 89107.

Michael: And give me your area code and phone number.

Mark: It’s (702) 505-4820.

Michael: And a fax.

Mark: No fax.

Michael: We’re meeting over the phone, and what is the date? What are we on, the 11 th or 12 th?

Mark: Today is the 13 th, December 13 th.

Michael: Going by fast.

Mark: Time flies when you’re having fun.

Michael: How hot is it there during the day now in Vegas?

Mark: About 65.

Michael: So, it’s not that hot at all.

Mark: It was very, very cold last week.

Michael: How long have you lived out there?

Mark: Twelve years.

Michael: Where are you from originally?

Mark: Florida…well, Indiana originally. Moved to Florida when I was about six. Raised in central Florida. Moved to North Carolina and then back to Georgia then back to central Florida, then southeast Florida.

Michael: You moved around a lot.

Mark: Well, actually I lived over on the southwest coast of Florida also. So, mostly southern Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina; that area.

Michael: I’m from Atlanta. Where did you live in Georgia?

Mark: ___, Georgia.

Michael: ___, I’ve heard of it. I don’t think that’s too far from Atlanta.

Mark: Well, it’s actually just across the southern border. You can make it to Jacksonville in about 45 minutes.

Michael: What this opportunity analysis worksheet is going to help us do, it’s going to help me isolate hidden marketing assets in your business and it’s going to help me determine specific marketing projects to optimize and leverage so those assets, we can maybe get some greater growth and profit from them. So, I don’t know how much I’ve told you. I don’t think I’ve told you much about who I am and why we’re talking today, so let me tell you quickly a little bit about what I’m going to do, okay.

Mark: Okay, great.

Michael: What I do many times over the phone is I work with business owners, people like yourself, helping them maximize their marketing success. Most of my clients are small and medium sized companies with sales under $5 million per year. And I work with a unique marketing approach. I look at all of your marketing assets or all the things you’re doing marketing-wise, and I find ways to leverage and optimize your success from the assets you already have in place. And because I try to leverage existing marketing assets, you can often realize pretty dramatic increases in growth and profit without having to invest a lot of money or make a lot of significant changes in your business right now. So, I’d like to do this. I’d like to take a look at your business, see where you are, where you’re going, how you’re going to get there, and see if there maybe some way we can help your business grow. Does that make sense?

Mark: That makes sense.

Michael: Most of the businesses I work with fall into one of three different situations. The first is they’re okay, but they want to do better. Two, they are stagnant and there is no growth, or three, they are declining. Tell me where you are now?

Mark: Well, actually I’m in start-up.

Michael: You’re in start-up. Obviously you’d like more growth from start-up, right? How much, if you could -- do you have any kind of goal in mind of how much growth you’d like to see? Have you thought about any kind of projections, yearly projects, anything quantitative?

Mark: As far as the amount of customer base and the income that I want to reach at a particular level; that type of thing?

Michael: Right.

Mark: That would be yes.

Michael: Do you have an idea how much you’d like to make in the next year in gross sales?

Mark: Well, I’d like to get to the level where…

Michael: What kind of goal…realistic goal that you’d like to see yourself accomplish?

Mark: I’d like to get it as quickly as possible just simply to $4,000 a month passive income.

Michael: Tell me a little bit about your business? Give me an overview of what you are doing?

Mark: It’s a basically a web based enterprise, I guess. And it’s www.howtowinthemoneygame.com . That site is a article site where experts in the different areas of the money game like the real estate game, the PR game, the marketing game, the Internet game post articles for people to come read to increase their knowledge in business. Each one of the areas is focused on a mentorship program and right now I’m focused on the real estate game. We have a membership website where we teach people how to go find properties, bring those in to investors, and put money in their pocket. And then we can bring them up to the next level of education with higher membership fee and it works its way up.

Michael: So, you’re using this site as you’re educating people who visit the site about ways to win the money game in these different areas and then you have a backend, which is a membership site, which tells them how to do it; the specifics.

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: You say howtowinthemoneygame.com, but it’s a niche then into different categories.

Mark: That’s correct.

Michael: And right now real estate is the one you have a backend program in place?

Mark: That’s correct. And it’s a template for the other areas.

Michael: Why should people join your membership site? Why should they do business with you?

Mark: Because we break the process down into single, easy steps where most real estate mentorship or educational programs in my experience kind of fall apart a bit is that they fill people with so much information that they’re overwhelmed and don’t know where to go. So, an entry level individual is trying to do sophisticated investments when they don’t have the solid background. So, what we do is we break it down into single, easy steps.

Michael: Who put together the website, yourself?

Mark: Myself and I have some assistance from a couple of individuals.

Michael: So, is there some expertise that you have in the development of these systems and steps why someone should join your membership site other than say Ron LaGrand or Carlton Sheets; any of these guys?

Mark: Well, actually we are using them. A lot of the coaching programs that those people promote actually are not their coaching programs. They’re a front end to the coaching program and the contractors do the work.

Michael: So, you’re using the same service provider that Ron LaGrand or Carlton Sheets would use to sell a coaching program. You’re basically selling the same coaching program. These guys don’t put together their own, they contracted out to a coaching program provider.

Mark: That’s correct. And there’s a number of coaching program providers.

Michael: How many are out there?

Mark: There’s about five or six that I know of right now.

Michael: Do they provide a good program, a good system of coaching?

Mark: A pretty good systems except I’m kind of breaking it down even more from that, and I’m also bringing in my own experts that are actually investors who are out investing. The coaches that are in my coaching program are real estate investors and they are actually purchasing the deals from the bird dogs and training.

Michael: So, when you hire a coach to handle some of your coaching fulfillment, you could work with them and tell them what you want for your customers, is that true?

Mark: Absolutely. And actually the way this works is the second level or the higher level membership are the ones who are coaching the lower level memberships because they’re actually buying the deals. If I’m a real estate investor and I’m buying properties, well, now I have bird dogs who go look for those properties. They bring them to me. I show them how to evaluate them and I buy the deal. So, I’m coaching them to do what I need.

Michael: Generally, from what you’ve explained, why should people use your coaching service rather than someone else’s?

Mark: Because we break it down into step-by-step process.

Michael: Where the other ones do what?

Mark: They overload you with information and it’s a lot more expensive.

Michael: So, it’s more expensive and there’s not really a system for your people to follow.

Mark: That’s correct. They use confusing systems; we simplify it so it’s easy to understand.

Michael: What do you find happens to a guy who pays for a coaching program and they’re overloaded with information?

Mark: It’s like a deer in headlights, they stop, then they go on to the next one.

Michael: When you’re telling people about your membership site, what you’ve explained to me, is this articulated on your website; the simplicity, they’re not overloaded with information, the price -- these reasons why someone should buy for you. Do you have this integrated in your marketing yet?

Mark: I believe that it is. Some people who have seen it do not say that that’s the case, so I’m working to articulate it more clearly.

Michael: That’s really important. Do you have any staff or is it just you?

Mark: It’s me and basically joint venture partners.

Michael: So, this is really the first step in improving your marketing and that is articulating your unique selling proposition in whatever it is, but you’ve touched on a couple of things. Your system is simple. You don’t overload the customer with information. You break it down into simple, simple steps so that they can succeed. Let’s say that those are the two most important things that make you different from all the other coaching programs, also, in addition to your price. Now, whenever you’re looking at a potential customer, whether it’s the copy on your website or whether it’s in a letter to a joint venture partner, this needs to be articulated and you just indicated that you’re aware of that and you want to try and get that articulated very clearly. Do you see how once that’s articulated in the message to your customer and even your joint venture partners that it brings clarity, a reason why someone should do business with you? Do you see how that can make you more money once that’s articulated in your marketing?

Mark: Absolutely. From my perspective, I understand it completely and it makes total sense to me. But when I explain it someone else, they go like what are you talking about. So, it definitely needs to be articulated more clearly in the joint venture partner manner and in the customer manner.

Michael: Now, nothing can, in my opinion and what I teach people, nothing can really be effectively done until you have this unique selling proposition or extra value proposition articulated simply and clearly where anyone can understand that reason why into your marketing. If you don’t have this articulated clearly, there’s really -- because this should be in every communication, every letter to a joint venture prospect, every letter or email to a potential customer, every follow-up email in an autoresponder sequence, every phone call that you have one on one; it should be articulated somewhere in that phone call so this message is repeated over and over again. Do you see what I’m saying?

Mark: Yes, absolutely.

Michael: There are multiple ways in getting this right. If I was to take you on as a client, it usually takes four to five weeks to come up with this unique selling proposition and there’s four specific things I do in doing it. One is the interview with you: another one. And two is interviewing and talking to and researching your competition. And then the other two steps are just integrating it and then reviewing it with you. But it’s critical in your marketing and you’ve got to have it done first. Let’s move on here. Tell me -- I know you’re a start-up, but do you have any current prospects, any members yet for your membership site?

Mark: Yes I do.

Michael: Where do you make the money with the business? They have content on your website and then they sign up for your membership site. What do you charge them for that?

Mark: I’m charging $47.98 a month.

Michael: What do they get with that?

Mark: What they get is a method and assistance in finding real estate properties affecting the deal.

Michael: They get it online within the membership site. Do they get phone calls with coaches?

Mark: If that’s required, yes. I have live help. There’s a message board. There are videos. We’ll do teleconference calls.

Michael: How much video is in the membership site?

Mark: Right now there’s just one video that shows how to fill out the form. I’m actually building the content of the website as I work with the members.

Michael: That’s good.

Mark: So, I don’t have to do it over and over and over and I’m not doing the wrong things.

Michael: So, you’re still building the content.

Mark: It will continually build. It’ll never be finished.

Michael: Fill in this sentence, if I become a member of your site, you’re going to show me a simple system that’s going to help me do what?

Mark: Find real estate properties that investors will purchase and give you a finder’s fee. And what we do when we first start you out is go over the different methods. You choose one that you feel comfortable with. Then we set you up with a system for that one method and when that system kicks into place and you’re comfortable with that, then you can move to other systems if you like.

Michael: So, pre-foreclosure; people in pre-foreclosure is one method?

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: Give me another method.

Mark: There’s expired listings. There’s bandit signs. There is 32 different methods.

Michael: Thirty-two methods of finding properties?

Mark: Yes, I probably have 32 in there now and there’s probably more than that that are coming one.

Michael: So, when did you start offering the membership site for sale?

Mark: Thirty days.

Michael: How many do you have in there?

Mark: I’ve got two paid members and I’ve got five unpaid members and I just got 26 new three-month free members yesterday.

Michael: So, you’re giving them a free three-month to check it out?

Mark: Yes.

Michael: And then hoping they turn into a paid member.

Mark: Yes.

Michael: And that was through a joint venture?

Mark: Yes. The closing rate is about 70%.

Michael: Wow, so if you have ten prospects visit the site or talk to you, 70% will end up joining.

Mark: So far because I’ve only had that many go to the site.

Michael: That’s not too bad.

Mark: Thirty went to the site; that’s the three-month free trial; 26 signed up.

Michael: That’s fantastic. That’s great. What do they have to do to sign up, fill out a form?

Mark: What they did to get the free three-month membership was purchase a book from Dr. Richard, who is the financial aerobics coach and then they get as a bonus for purchasing the book three months free member.

Michael: How much was his book?

Mark: $20.

Michael: That’s great. Those are pretty qualified prospects.

Mark: Yes. And so they come to the website. I tell them a little story and they…

Michael: How do you tell them a story -- on audio?

Mark: No, it’s just written. I basically congratulate them for purchasing the book and what a smart decision that was. Tell them how Dr. Richard twisted my arm to give away these memberships and ask them a favor not to tell anybody how to get to this page unless they bought the book because they’re really not qualified to invest in real estate because they don’t have the financial backing from buying the book and that type of thing. And then give me your name and email and I send a coupon code. And I also put the phone number on there, but that’s not required. But so far, only one has not given me their phone number.

Michael: So, you are capturing all your prospects and people who sign up, all their information.

Mark: Yes, the email, name and phone number. And then once they go to the site to give me the coupon, to redeem the coupon, then I get their address, phone number; all that information.

Michael: Now, what happens to the 30% who did not come through, did not buy or sign up?

Mark: I have a pop-up that asks them why they did not.

Michael: Did any of them fill it out?

Mark: Just a couple.

Michael: Is there any more follow-up on these prospects?

Mark: On the ones that have filled out the pop-up no because I don’t capture their email address.

Michael: So, the ones who did not come through in signing up, you had no way to -- they visited the site, but you had no way to contact them afterwards?

Mark: Right because I don’t know who they were. They just looked at the site and didn’t fill anything out. It’s just passing traffic.

Michael: Is there a way to get in touch with those anywhere from your autoresponders or sign-ups, anyway to track these people who never came through as signing up with the membership site for their free three months?

Mark: No, that’s on someone else’s database.

Michael: Could you isolate those by any chance? Could we get those names of the people who didn’t come through? If you worked with your joint ventures to say, look, obviously everyone you send us is not going to come through. So, let’s say you had the 30 people who bought the book from the aerobics teacher -- that aerobics book, right. Let’s say there were 30 people who bought the book. He knows who bought the book, right. Now, you know that 23 came through and redeemed their certificate for the free three months, right. Is he getting any kind of commission on this?

Mark: Yes.

Michael: So, he’s an affiliate, right?

Mark: Yes.

Michael: If you said to him, look, we’re doing great so far and I’m going to show you how we can do greater. If you could just provide me all of the people who bought the book so I can continually educate the people who didn’t make a decision right away so we can get them to come aboard down the road. I want to do follow-ups with the people who maybe were too busy that day or that time…

Mark: That’s part of our joint venture. We’ll be re-promoting and re-promoting and re-promoting.

Michael: Do you have to rely on your joint venture person to re-promote to those people who bought the book or will he give you control of those name so you can do it? He knows who bought all the books, right?

Mark: Well, actually no because the books were bought by Amazon. You don’t have control of that. But then when they come back and request the bonus…

Michael: Amazon’s got to pay him a commission.

Mark: Right.

Michael: He should have a…

Mark: They don’t tell you who the customers are as far as I know.

Michael: Amazon won’t tell you who the customers are?

Mark: I don’t think that they do. I can find out if that’s the case, but I don’t think they do. It’s one of the difficulties we have. That’s why we do the big bonus thing so we do capture as many of those as possible.

Michael: I would check into that. I don’t know for sure, but I would think if Amazon’s paying a commission on sales of books sold through Amazon, they’ve got to give him the data with the payout. You find out and if there’s a way -- just like PayPal, you know what PayPal is right?

Mark: Right.

Michael: Everyone who has PayPal has their entire database; email address, name, address, city, state -- all that in a database you can download in about ten seconds right from your PayPal account. So, I would check with Amazon and if you can get control of all those sales or get some contact information whether it’s a phone number or…

Mark: I’m not going to be able to. Part of the agreement is that when I give away the bonus through the promotion, whoever comes and signs up, they’re in my database. The rest of the database belongs to the other people because it’s like a cross promotion with line 15 people.

Michael: So, that’s with your joint venture partners. Now, how about your own lead generation and your own prospects to the website? When they come to your website, do you have a follow-up system for people who don’t come through signing up for the membership site? Have you thought that far to have someone who comes to your site who has inquired? For instance, when they go to the site and see all the free content, do they have to fill out a form or a name or an email address to get to that information?

Mark: Well, we give them one free article in each area and then in order to get more articles, then they sign up for a free membership. They have unlimited access to all the articles as a free member.

Michael: One article from each category, no more and then if they want more, they’ve got to go through and sign up for the whole free membership.

Mark: Well, that’s a different membership from the bird dog membership. The free membership for How To Win The Money Game is just simply name, email. They’re my database. Now, I can market to them and sort them and find out who they are.

Michael: When do they sign up for that? How To Win The Money Game, at what point do they sign up for that? What do they get when they fill out the Money Game dot com?

Mark: They get access to all of the articles.

Michael: Now, when they do that that means they signed up for their membership right?

Mark: They’ve signed up for a free membership with How To Win The Money Game dot com. They’ve not signed up for a membership in the mentorship program. Basically, How To Win The Money Game is the level one.

Michael: Level one, all the free content.

Mark: Right, all the free. Level two is the $49 membership.

Michael: Is that the one you did with the joint venture where you gave three months of the $49 one away?

Mark: That’s right. So, they’re in level two.

Michael: So, with that joint venture partner, they’re in level two.

Mark: That’s correct.

Michael: So, once someone signs up for all the level one free content, what are you doing to get them to level two; not including your joint venture partners?

Mark: Well, I’ll be sending…I don’t have really very many in there. I think maybe one or two.

Michael: Well, since you’re just starting, but let’s talk about the system. Those one and two, they fill out the form; they fill out their name and email address. They’re in level one with all the free content. What other system is in place to move them to level two?

Mark: To keep them updated of what’s going on; offers, free offers. Warm them up, build a relationship, ask them questions of what they’re interested in and then give that to them.

Michael: That’s what I was trying to get at. So, you can see that those people who are in level one and haven’t moved to level two how important it is to keep communicating with them and keep communicating USP in every message.

Mark: Absolutely. I’ve bypassed that to get income quickly.

Michael: Right, I understand. You did the joint venture with the level two to get some income going, but this is going to be an important part of getting people from level one to level two.

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: So, that USP has to be integrated in all your email messages. If it’s going to be a phone call of someone telling them the unique selling proposition, trying to move them to level two. Do you see how that can increase your closing rate by having multiple follow-up messages whether it’s email, phone, a written letter or a postcard? Do you see how that can increase your closing rate; moving someone from level one to a paying level two.

Mark: Yes, right. That’s why my closing rate right now is so high because I’m at level two. People who are basically in level one; they’re not in my level one, they’re in someone else’s, but I just moved them from their level one to my level two.

Michael: That wouldn’t apply to what I‘m asking here. We’re talking about your level one people. We need to integrate your USP in all your communications whether email, phone call, postcard, direct mail. And that’s going to increase your bottom line closing.

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: That’s the second process in what I do with a potential customer is that integration of the USP that we develop in the first step, we put that in all the communications and we integrate the USP in all your communications with your potential prospects so that consistent message is played over and over again in your sales process. This is your sales process. But you’ve got to integrate that USP in your sales process.

Mark: Right, it allows them to understand what it is so they’re not confused.

Michael: That’s right.

Mark: And that’s our bird dog program. You go find a property. You bring it back. That’s it. You go find a property and you bring it back. That’s it. You just go find a property; you bring it back. And that’s all I do. You just find a property and you bring it back. That’s it. And you get a check.

Michael: Past, present and prospective customers; what I usually do is I look for a customer base that is not being worked -- inactive customers, any cross selling opportunities in the business, backend opportunities. So, since you don’t have a customer base right now, I see what you’re doing is you’re using the customer bases of joint venture prospects.

Mark: Yes, absolutely.

Michael: That’s the way to go. That’s a great way to leverage. Many times I’ll have a client who’s got a lot of customers, but they’re not doing anything with them, they’re sitting there. And you know why they don’t do anything with them because they don’t know what to tell them. They don’t know what to send in an email. They don’t know what to offer. They don’t know what to communicate to them because they never had to USP. Once you have your USP it’s a cinch because you can say, hey I haven’t heard from you in a long time, but remember you had come to my site back in November and what we do different is we keep the system simple. We show you how to go find a property and bring it back. And we’ve customized our consultant’s training to work with you, but we keep it simple and our price is better. So, why don’t you come on back for a free two weeks membership to our site? Here’s your authorization code. Do you how that can make you more money if you had that customer list just by inviting them back?

Mark: Right.

Michael: Your alliance opportunities is really joint ventures and that’s the fourth thing I work with potential clients and we look for other relationships that you could do business with. So, let’s talk about that. First of all let me ask you this, who are your customers? Who are the end users in that membership site, the second level? How would you describe them -- age, sex, income; any ideas on that?

Mark: Well, what it would be is the age can be anywhere from 18 to probably 45. When someone gets up into the older…older people…its still entry level. So, the income base is not going to be that high. I would say that’s more important is the income base and it’s probably from $20,000 to $35-$40,000. I don’t really think someone at $50,000 would be interested in entry level because that’s entry level. When someone starts as a real estate agent, an entry-level real estate agent, they’re trained to go find listings. That’s what they do. And it’s the same with real estate investors. The first thing you learn how to do is find the deal. Now, once you’ve accomplished that task and you’re proficient at that, then you kind of move up. You figure out how to do the financing or how to put the deal together or how to move the deal to somebody else or a number of more sophisticated techniques. Now, once you’ve accomplished that task, now you move to another more sophisticated technique; multi-family units, commercial properties. Then once you’ve accomplished that, then you go from buying properties to building properties. So, it’s different levels of expertise. With How To Win The Money Game, we start everybody out at entry level. You always come in at entry level and work your way up.

Michael: Are your customers people who are residential real estate agents, brokers, opportunity seekers; how would you categorize…?

Mark: Opportunity seekers -- people who are currently working and looking for additional income. It could be like a stay at home Mom. I guess another way to say what my client is, is someone who wants an additional $3,000 to $4,000 a month with working part time. That’s the customer.

Michael: Tell me about this joint venture, the guy who wrote this book. Who are his customers?

Mark: It is people who want to improve their financial situation.

Michael: You could offer this to anyone who has currently expressed interest in some way to make more money part time from home.

Mark: Yes, absolutely.

Michael: Could you niche it to specifically real estate agents? Since we’re dealing in properties and it’s related to real estate, could you offer this opportunity to real estate agents? Say, I know you’re a real estate agent in the San Diego, California area and I know you’ve been an agent for less than six months…

Mark: No.

Michael: Why not?

Mark: Because if I could get to them before they went to real estate school, yes.

Michael: Why do you say before?

Mark: Well, because basically it’s the same training that you’re getting before you go to real estate school. Someone who has been trained in real estate, who has a real estate license, I’m going to get them in level three or level four. Not at a $40 membership. I’m going to go after them with a $400 a month membership.

Michael: What do see them getting for $400 a month that they don’t get in the level two; the $47 a month?

Mark: They can actually buy the deal.

Michael: This one joint venture came about how?

Mark: Well, actually I had helped Dan Roby promote his book a few months back and that was actually when I first started putting this thing together. And I ran into Warren Whitlock, who does the promotions of these books and just was talking about joint ventures and he says, hey, I got this one that we’re sending out tomorrow or a couple of days from now, let’s drop you in there. So, we got dropped in there. So, I have a network of these people who do these books. It’s not an uncommon thing. We’re looking at doing two or three more here in the next week or two.

Michael: Would you say you have plenty of ideas to offer this program with joint venture partners like what you did with this guy?

Mark: Yes, I think so.

Michael: Let’s look at and I want you to get clear in your mind because this is part of the training or part of what I do for a consultant is I help them establish and set up other joint venture possibilities. So, I would say, okay, you’ve got something that can show someone how to make a couple thousand, $3,000, $4,000 a month bird dogging, working part time from their home with your easy to follow system, right. So, I would say what type of people are looking for that and maybe I would go to the SRDS. Do you know what the SRDS is?

Mark: Yes.

Michael: Standard Rate and Data Service and I would search the direct mail list or I would look for email list that I could rent for maybe 15-cents a name. So, for $150 a thousand, I maybe able to rent a thousand names of people who in the last 30 days have just purchased a money making opportunity report or product or cassette program on how to make money on Ebay. You’ve seen the guy on TV who sells the Ebay secrets course?

Mark: Right.

Michael: There are millions of those names available for rent. Now, these are people who have spent money in the last 30 days. Now, if they’ve ordered through an infomercial that may not be the best list. You may want to find that this company has generated sales and is selling his list or renting his list of people who have responded to a direct mail piece. But this buyer may be a potential buyer for your system. Would you agree?

Mark: I absolutely agree. The reason why I’m not going after lists right now is because of the capital. I’m looking more for the owner of the list and offering them 50% of the membership fee.

Michael: That’s fine. But you can test the list very inexpensively. Let’s say the minimum order is 5,000 names. Let’s say you can rent the names for 20-cents apiece, which is probably about right. So, 20-cents times a thousand is $200. You’re going to have to invest $1,000 for just the names; 5,000 names.

Mark: Right, but at this point in time I don’t have that investment.

Michael: But let’s say one of your joint ventures pays out and you start making some money down the road; let’s say two or three months down the road.

Mark: There’s no question about it, yes I will be doing that. They’re a lot cheaper than a joint venture.

Michael: That’s right. You don’t have send out to all 5,000. You can send out to 1,000 of them, so you’ve still got the 4,000. But you want to test 1,000. So, it may cost you $500 to get a mail piece in the mail to people who have just spent money on a course on how to make money on Ebay from a direct mail piece and who have done it in the last 30 days and you know they’ve all used a credit card because you can buy those names. You see?

Mark: Right.

Michael: And if it plays out, let’s say that the test is successful and you’re able to bring in more money than it costs you to do the promotion and you know you have millions of names on the list, you see the potential there?

Mark: Absolutely, yes.

Michael: So, that’s what I’m saying and that’s what I’m saying by looking for other joint venture opportunities where you don’t have to pay out the 50% commission and you’re not reliant on them doing everything. You start setting up your own deals. And if you can make it work on a small scale -- if you have a market big enough or a list big enough, you can make it work on a large scale.

Mark: Right.

Michael: And then it’s just adding zeros. Are you with me?

Mark: Absolutely.

Michael: The SRDS is a wonderful place to look for those other potential markets. And that’s what I do for a client is I’ll go in there and I’ll match up -- I’ll match up your customer and I’ll find similar customers who have already raised their hand, who have already spent money, who already have a credit card, and who are already proven buyers. That’s going to be a lot better mailing out to or communicating with, whether it’s a phone call, a mail out, or an email than to prospects who you don’t know fit those criteria. You don’t know if they have money. You don’t know if they have a credit card. You don’t know if they’ve bought anything. You see?

Mark: Right.

Michael: So, you’re targeting a market that you have intelligence on and that’s going to improve your responses much better.

Mark: I have no doubt.

Michael: The next area of what we do with a potential client is media. And we look for different media avenues that they use. You’re not using any kind of offline advertising to get people to your site or are you?

Mark: Not yet, but I was just talking actually with a radio station yesterday and like a penny-saver. And I’m just starting to kind of build a relationship with them and I’m looking to leverage their particular assets.

Michael: Very good. Well, penny-saver -- you can mail out to targeted geographical zip codes. Were you thinking about doing an advertisement that offers an opportunity that directs them to your website?

Mark: Yes. I want them to go to the website to get their name and address.

Michael: But you’re not doing any advertising right now?

Mark: The only thing that I’m doing as far as advertising is working with Google ad words and Overture paper.

Michael: I’m going to take you back to the very first step. I’m going to take you back to the unique selling proposition and these compelling reasons why someone should go to your site or go an sign up with your level one or level two or what have you.

Mark: What I’m doing is getting them into a teleseminar so I can ask them what they want.

Michael: You’re doing that to try to determine which part of your website you want to direct them to or what they want in general?

Mark: Well, what they want in general so that I can improve the copy.

Michael: In the development of the USP that’s what we’ll do for you or that’s what I would do for a client and that’s through research. So, finding out what they want is really all done in that first step. So, let’s assume that I’ve already done or that you’ve done that for yourself. Once you know what that potential customer wants and the compelling reason why, your USP, do you see how this USP has to be integrated in all your advertising?

Mark: Well, what I’m seeing right now is when you’re talking about that and I’m looking at what I’m currently doing, I’m all over the place trying to figure out what it is that I’m doing. But if I do have the unique selling proposition, it’s going to fine tune and hone that, so I’m not a hundred different messages trying to figure what’s unique or where I need to be.

Michael: That’s right. So, you’re going to figure that out in the first step and then it’s part of the integration. I don’t bring up media advertising in the second part, which was integrating your USP because a lot of people aren’t doing outside media advertising. But since you’re considering it, if you do consider it, this is going to be one part of integrating that USP. It must be in your media advertising. Do you see how having that USP in your media advertising or in all your promotions can bring you in more money? Next is something that not a lot of clients use, but some do and there are ways to leverage this and that’s community marketing. What I usually do is I look for ways to boost the image of your company. Is there any unique owner experience? Do you have some unique experience in the real estate field buying or selling or finding investors like what you’re teaching yourself or is this just a marketing project for you?

Mark: It’s a marketing project for me.

Michael: Have you ever considered doing seminars, little mini-seminars or workshops in your local area?

Mark: Yes.

Michael: Another idea is using press release. Have you studied any Paul Hartunian stuff?

Mark: No I haven’t, but I’m actually…that’s one of the reasons why I put together How To Win The Money Game because it covers every area of the money game and over in the PR game I’ve got a guy over there or a couple of guys and I’m actually setting them up to compete with each other in the game.

Michael: Very good. So, if you were to do some small mini-seminars on How To Win The Money Game and you could do a press release or you could work with your Chamber of Commerce or you can do those ___ meetings. And doing these seminars may be a great way of bringing in second level and third level members.

Mark: Yes, I’m structuring now and working on what my presentation will be and that type of thing. That’s kind of what I’m in the situation now is building my speech and building that. My mind keeps going back to the USP; to get that down because if I’m building all this stuff and it’s not focused around the unique selling proposition, I’m going to have to kind of scrap it and start over.

Michael: That’s exactly right. That’s right and that’s why most people never would never get to this stage because they don’t have the USP clearly defined and it’s got to be integrated in even that; in your promotion for your seminar. And so that’s what our consultants do or I do for a client is in this step, I would work with you in developing some promotional pieces. I have templates actually of successful flyers and promotions that sponsor seminars that your USP can be integrated in so you could get those going.

Mark: That would be great.

Michael: That comes under community marketing, as well as press releases. I have template press releases that we would take your USP and we would integrate into a template of a press release that you could send out to the local media that could get you some free publicity and some people signing up for your seminar. The next step, and we discussed a little bit, is direct marketing and we look for ways in which the business and its products and services could be marketed directly to the consumer through a letter or a classified ad or through an infomercial. That’s always a possibility. And we talked about that example using the SRDS, which is a real effective way. These are some of the things that we’ve talked about you should consider doing either for yourself or when you get the funds. Many people who want marketing help don’t have time or don’t want to do it themselves and they really want someone to do it for them. Do you know what I’m saying?

Mark: Right. Well, if you do it yourself and you’re not skilled in that area, you’re back to square one at entry level and you don’t want to be at entry level forever.

Michael: Right. Now, I know you explained finances are something that’s tight right now, but as your business grows and as you bring in some memberships and you’ve got some residuals coming in, the way I work is I work strictly on a project-by-project basis. And depending on what we do, the fee is usually anywhere from $2,000 to $3,500 per project. And this way is different in that you wouldn’t be hiring me where you’re stuck with me. You’re only paying me per project. So, the first project would be developing a USP and that would be something I feel you have to have before you can move on to any of those projects.

Mark: Oh, I see. I see that absolutely because it’ll keep you stuck.

Michael: Exactly. We offer a guarantee on my consulting services where if you go through all the seven projects that I discussed with you, the alliance opportunities, integrating the USP, developing the USP, the community marketing, all these things, we guarantee that you’ll make your investment work or we’ll do whatever we can and work with you until you’ve made that investment back. So, we’ve got a guaranteed program. And as you bring in some more income, is working with myself or one of our trained consultants something that maybe interesting to you?

Mark: Well, it sounds like it would definitely save me a significant amount of time and effort. And the way that I have the program set up with memberships, a hundred memberships brings me $5,000 and it shouldn’t be that difficult to…which doesn’t even come into the third level because the third level is $300 a month. Definitely what my issue is, is it’s not that hard to achieve my 100 members, but the timeframe that I’m working at right now, I think I’m doing it pretty darn quick. We’d always like to have it done quicker.

Michael: Well, has some of the things I’ve talked about has it helped you and kind of clarified somewhat of a system of what you need to do?

Mark: Oh absolutely, there’s no question about it. With the unique selling proposition, I keep hearing it and I say, well, I’ll get to that in a minute. I have a whole lot of other things to do, which is ridiculous because it’s going to save me tons of time, effort, and frustration to get that done first. I have a good handle on what it’s supposed to be, I’ve just not set aside the time for it because I have to sit down and figure and write it all out and go over all the process to do that when my mindset has been do something right now to get some money in, then worry about that other stuff. And actually, I can see where not doing the unique selling proposition is slowing down the time to bring in the money quick. Take care of this first, it’ll make those other things happen quicker.

Michael: Exactly.

Mark: When I talked to my joint venture partners, I kind of give them the big picture. Then they go like, there’s so much for me to do here, I don’t understand what he’s talking about. I have other things to do. But if I boil it down to the unique selling proposition, like when you first came on and were telling me what it is that you do, I could tell specifically what you do uniquely. To guess around at what you were doing and how it was going to be accomplished.

Michael: You got the picture. That’s exactly right.

Mark: What do I need to do to keep in touch with you?

Michael: If you want someone to take you through the system for what you’re doing, we can do that. The first step on the USP is $2,000 and when or if you’re ready now or if you want to do it in a month from now, I’m here. When you’re ready, I can do it myself or I have other trained consultants who have trained in this system that I described to implement this stuff for you.

Mark: You have my contact information so you’ll forward that information.

Michael: You’ll call me. I won’t call you back. When you’re ready, if you want to do, just give me a call. Now, what I would like to do, I’d like to send you out a couple special reports that I have. One specific report is on media advertising and I’ll email them over to you and it’ll have all my contact information on there. So, if you change your mind, you want to…I don’t know, take out a loan or put on your credit card and have someone implement this USP for you right away within the next 30 days, we can get started on that. And I think once you have that, whether you use me for any of the other steps, you’re going to have the most important thing down. You can do some of that other stuff yourself.

Mark: Right, well, I’m expecting with the marketing effort that I already have in place, it’s any day now, the money’s coming in. I’ve been working on it now pretty hard for a month and a half and the results just started trickling in, like I said, the sign ups with that joint venture that was just last night.

Michael: That’s wonderful.

Mark: So, that’s how things are kind of…it takes…

Michael: It takes time. You’re going to do it.

Mark: It takes time to get those things in place.

Michael: Exactly.

Mark: So, it’s starting to happen now and definitely there’s too much work for me to do by myself. It’s ridiculous to think of that. So, yes that sounds great.

Michael: You’ve got all my information. Pick up the phone, call me, and when you’re ready to go, I’m ready to go with you.

Mark: Absolutely sounds great.

Michael: It’s sounds like you’ve got a great start on a start-up. It sounds like you’re doing a lot of things right; you just need a little direction and help.

Mark: I think so and a little time.

Michael: Time, I know how it is. Well, good. Thanks, I’ve enjoyed the experience and I hope it’s been helpful for you. Will you send me an email again today?

Mark: I’ll do that.

Michael: Send me an email, say Mike send me the recording. I’ll send you a link to this recording where you can play it over and then I’m going to have my guy edit it. We’ll edit out all the ums and the ands and all that. If you want to wait for that, I’ll send you the edited version too.

Mark: That will be great.

Michael: Thank you for letting me doing a recording on this. It sounds good. I think has been a real good example.

Mark: I hope that I did my best to make it a good example.

Michael: You did. You’re typical of most businesses and especially most business start-up. Its just people are so busy working in their business and time is a factor. They need help. They need an expert to come in there and shave off that time factor and time is money.

Mark: Right.

Michael: This recording has been some of the best marketing advice you’ve heard in a long time. Richard’s proven system of uncovering hidden marketing assets in a business is based on his 15 years of marketing consulting and it works. Whether you’re a new business looking for a way to systematize your marketing or if you want to be a marketing consultant helping small to medium sized businesses while making a very comfortable income working part time from home, Richard’s system can shortcut the learning process for you. For information on Richard’s marketing system, call (858) 274-7851. That’s (858) 274-7851. And I promise you a valuable free gift. All you have to do is email me at Contact by Email . In the subject line put free gift and I’ll email you a special link for you to get your free gift. Thanks a lot.