Sitting around last night doing what I do best – put off working on websites. Sure I had the laptop on but me and the desktop icons stared blankly at each other until I could no longer resist the urge to click on the little fox icon encircling the globe. It always looked to me like the globe rolled over the fox and he was mashed flat. I’m sure there is a more optimistic meaning that we are supposed to embrace.
Anyway, Yahoo Mail seemed like the best place to start as I resisted the urge to do anything meaningful. I opened up the Inbox and started clicking the little boxes to delete all the crap that I allow to collect for various stupid reasons. Offers for this or that. Newsletters for forgotten interests. Affiliate managers begging me to get to work and promote their crap. Jokes that have been passed around since ’99. Etc.
Of course there were the requisite Internet Marketing offers for getting rich. Or successful. Or something. I noticed another ebook/course/membership or whatever it is they are pimping on how to plan, build and promote websites. And I considered this offer as I have others many times before it. I have bought maybe 10 or so ebooks that detail the authors plan to create online properties that will make you successful in Internet Marketing. I have read maybe 10 others that came as bonuses from this membership or that program I purchased. And none have really helped.
I thought about this ebook phenomenon. How there is so much hope each time we purchase one. You buy it and it doesn’t inspire you to do anything with it. Or you try the method and it doesn’t seem to work for you. You become more and more jaded each ebook you buy. You become embarrassed to admit that you bought just one more in the hopes that it would spark something in you. They are like crack. The salesletter makes you think that maybe this is the one. After about 10 or so you are simply done and feel like you have learned your lesson. Not how to be successful but simply that it’s far better to buy the dinner the salesletter said you could give up for the price of the ebook.
It’s the Yin and Yang of getting rich on the Internet. There are a lot of crappy ebooks floating out there. There are a ton of folks looking for a solution that just doesn’t exist. There are a lot good ideas yet plenty of lazy people.
It makes you feel bad to read an ebook and not make money the way it was represented. Maybe in a way you feel like a failure. People don’t talk about it. You hardly ever hear people admit they spent $47 on some technique and it went tits up on them. They just file the ebook away and write shitty blogs about how ebooks are ripoffs.
But who is the real failure? If a writer cannot reach the reader then they have failed. Of all the ebooks that have been written about building planning, building and promoting websites, why are people still struggling with the concept? Writers argue that readers are lazy and that they want to be spoonfed. So if you truly want to help people wouldn’t it be incumbent on you, the writer, to motivate these people, outside of the damn salesletter!?
There is a really great ebook that has yet to be written. One that doesn’t regurgitate 98% of what we’ve all known since 2005. One that actually disperses the remaining 2% that matters. One that motivates. One that teaches. One that feeds you every mouthful.
We will no doubt search for that ebook and feel like shit for doing so. Ebooks will come and go. Most we will simply let float on by. But there will always be that one that makes us think that this time will be different. It won’t be but we still hope.
I haven’t bought an ebook in over a year I don’t think. Probably longer. Those days are past. I make some money each month and it’s good enough (ADD continues to rule and things are scattered.) But every once in a while I hesitate before clicking the checkbox to delete an email wondering if that could be the one. Too cynical to think otherwise I click delete.
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
Being a cheap bastard has served me well in the making money on the internet game. I learned early on from Griz and later Court…never got much into Vic’s style…..Course you have helped me at times too….anytime I’ve been somewhat temped to buy something “secret” I’ve run it through this site and avoided a few bad apples. Heck my biggest temptation has been BMD and I’ve still held out on that one. Maybe someday.
Being cheap certainly has its uses in this racket. Griz (when he’s participating) and Court, with a little help from the down under boys, is about all I bother with anymore. But mostly I’m going my own way anymore.
Have you been cranking hubpages like everyone else in the KWA? I was about to start up on it, but saw your other post about them possibly being slammed by G shortly. Hate to waste a bunch of time on that just to have them end up worthless….I’ve been in the KWA a few months, but not sure if its really of much use to me anymore.
I’ve never bought an e-book, but I’ve read a few….
I find it incredibly difficult to read them without being distracted (ADD here too). I get interested in something they mention and off I go to check it out (not an affiliate link though)… and then I check something out from where I’ve clicked to… and check something out there too… and so it goes on.
Then I get on with actually working on the internet. And at the end of the evening the e-book gets closed… never to be opened again.
Guess I’m an e-book failure too
While I know you are aware of it, you didn’t mention the other option regarding ebook authors, and that’s that they don’t CARE if you do anything with the technique or not so long as you buy what they’re selling. I think you’d probably agree that’s a rather large percentage of them.
If it was “the one” it would not be on sale for $47 or whatever.
I know a few things that work ref making money from sites. I do not post about them on blogs and I do not sell the information. Instead, I try to capitalise on it myself.
The idea that anyone would sell a method of making $100,000 for $49 is utterly ridiculous…. dont be fooled… again!!
Just think… you have a sure fire method that is making you $100k per year would you:
1) Post the method on your blog
2) Sell it for $49
3) Use it to make $100k per year
4) Try to make $500k per year with it?
Software is the one I have got stung on though… I have bought some very good software tools in my time, which made me gamble on a few not so good ones… nothing major, but one thing I did learn is that Pay Pal does not protect you… at all.
You can buy a complete dud and Pay Pal just say “we dont intervene in matters of product quality”… so, if you want to rip people off with software:
1) Use Pay Pal, as this will instil false confidence in your buyers
2) Offer a “cast iron money back guarantee”
3) Print a sales page of lies
4) Ship out a product, anything, it doesnt matter if it works. It doesn’t matter if it is not as you described it in your pitch.
5) Ignore requests for refund
6) Ignore Pay Pal disputes
7) Spend the money you stole
aaronk. Yea, I’ve been building about 3 or 4 hubpages a week. Nothing to get overly excited about. But it’s more for a project I have going on at Today.com than for Adsense scraps. Quick provocative Hubs to send traffic to Today.com. Mostly pics and vids. On that particular account my Hubpage rank stays around 90 so the Hubs are useful for traffic funneling and backlinks.
I went back and rewrote and freshened up some of my Hubpages on a couple of accounts. Targeted keywords better, etc. I’ve made a few bucks and noticed that I’ve got some PR2-3 Hubs. It doesn’t suck. Though you never know what Google will think about them over time.
TKA- I stay for the “article directories”. Quite useful I think.
I would agree that most sellers are simply pumping out the ebooks. They figure if 50% or better do not ask for refunds they will make out alright. I doubt most care if you read it or not. I’m not sure they should but if people don’t read it, it makes it a failure regardless of how much money is made. Weird
Hey Splork,
Offtopic but how well indexed are the KWA article sites? Do you pay attention to how fast your posts on the sites show up in google?
I’m thinking of rejoining just to have access to the directories but I want to know if the links are good and get picked up fast or if people are just spamming them or what.
Thanks
My posts show up in G pretty fast. Well indexed. Not spammed as only members can post and each one is approved by Court. Plus remember that it is Mark and Court who run these. SEO experts. Over time they will be significant.
I disagree with your comment that it is up to the ebook writer to motivate. Yes they should motivate, but that blame doesn’t entirely fall on them. Otherwise you should point the finger at virtually every single ‘how-to’ author in existence. Not just make money online gurus.
There are people writing books on how to play guitar, or how to improve your golf game, or how to speak a foreign language. Yet the success rate of people buying and reading such educational books is low as people often lose motivation or don’t implement things properly as a teacher is not present to push them along, plus there is no penalty for not completing what they set out to do. Making money online is like learning any other skill. And it requires consistent dedication and solid application of the basics. I’m not saying I don’t agree with you that there are a lot of crap ebooks out there, but much of the basics are taught well out there. For example, search engine optimization, conversion tactics, outsourcing, finding profitable niches and so forth. There’s no reason why you can’t master all of those, just don’t go looking for a get rich quick scheme and start putting together proper websites that provide solutions to what people are searching for, it isn’t rocket science.
I would have to agree with Joe, I think many ebook publishers know that many people will not read the book or at least read all of it.
Even more will not act on it. Some will ask for a refund but many others will just forget to act putting it aside till later and later never comes.