I have been spammed mercilessly for Rich Schefren’s Manifesto and video. Even after the Great Optin Purge (GOP) I still have guberus tracking down my email and sending me a link to go watch the video or download the report. Apparently this dude is the newest IM star. He makes millions of dollars every minute. Everyone should want to run a business just like him. He’s a guru’s guru. Guru’s worship at the altar of the Schefren truth.
I read this manifesto. Does death by PowerPoint mean anything to you? Honestly it was like sitting through a meeting at work while some asshat gets up and rambles about meeting this quarter’s projection.
What did I get out of it? Nothing new. He just pretties up what everybody who’s been in this business for more than 6 months already knows. Find and stick with a system. Stop buying everything thinking it will lead you to the holy grail of greed. Outsource what you can, when you can. “Build a business”. Quite a manifesto, huh?
And then there is the video. 1 hour and 30 minutes of this guy basically telling me I don’t have time to be in this (IM) business. That I can’t do it all. You’ve all seen the picture with all the tasks we have to do to run our online business.
It looks pretty daunting. Until you really look at it and realize that the average webmaster already “outsources” a good many of the tasks. I don’t do server maintenance, software development, etc. If you don’t sell goods you can pretty much erase half of the poster. “Testimonial Aquisitions”? Am I the only one who believes that 50% or more of those are lies anyway?
He says that people go into this business and end up just taking on another job. You know, the whole Kiyosaki (Rich Dad, Poor Dad) thing where you should own a business and not another job. Well, he’s still working. He didn’t outsource his little talk. He’s still coaching. He’s still developing partnerships like those with Agora. But I guess that is his definition of productive time. Here’s my definition: You have a job as long as you are answering to someone whether you are a multi-millionaire or a toady like me.
And no I haven’t missed the point. The guy will make more money in one day than I will the rest of the year. I get that.
Maybe the coaching will be worth the $5,000. Been there. Done that. Never again.
I chuckled at reading all the kiss-up comments on the website where the video is shown. Good grief. “Incredible stuff”. “Over delivering”. “Awesome”. I’m telling you it was 1 hour and 30 minutes of him telling you that you don’t have enough time to be successful in this business if you do it all alone. It never ceases to amuse me to observe people under the influence of a skilled marketer and/or salesperson. It’s like a cult.
Must have been lucky to have gotten the email notifications from my gurus. He writes in the manifesto:
“I am starting to get a lot of flack from fellow marketers who feel this report could hurt their businesses. There is actually a group of marketers who are attempting to block me from getting other list owners to mail this manifesto out.”
Why do people write stuff like this? Who the hell could remotely care if he publishes this work? And why should he care either way? I absolutely abhor these kind of marketing tactics.
I don’t know why this fires me up like it does. Actually, wasting my valuable time reading the hyped-up manifesto and watching the video bugs the hell out of me. It’s like all of sudden everyone needs a “manifesto” to tell you that you can’t do it all? We know that. But you do what you can and build it up. And when you make some money, put it back into the business and outsource a few pieces at a time. Then free up that time. Or build it bigger.
And you don’t need fancy flow charts and PowerPoint presentations to develop a strategy. Yes, I realize the value and importance of a business plan. Join Affilorama and let Mark tell you how to start a business in 90-days, step-by-step. Brad Callen is another with a great course. Get “The Plan” at SEO2020.com. The process map is already built for you.
So here I stand on my soapbox. I can hear the crickets in the distance. I don’t make millions so clearly I’m not doing something right. Just a little guy throwing a stone at Goliath. But I’m certainly not going to get sucked into another coaching program from yet another guru who thinks he has all the answers.
So, I will be working at purging more opt-in newsletters and building a site. No doubt wasting my time.
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
If any of these “I will tell you how to make millions for only $199.99″ guys were genuinely making millions, why would they bother selling this stuff and sharing their secrets (thus creating competition for themselves)?
Just a thought.
I agree to a degree. I think there are some marketers that have made enough money to be sucessful and now have a desire to teach others. I’m not quite jaded enought to think that there aren’t some good guys out there willing to share and help. I’m just not eating what these big infomercial-type marketing guru salesmen are serving. I don’t believe the hype and I will not get suckered again.
Splork,
Hey, not just crickets out there. I swear you and I are living in parallel universes – I have been unsubscribing from just about everything. I can’t do all, be all, jump on this jump on that – that is just craziness.
I’ve got plans for about 6 websites, based on things I know and like. I don’t expect to make millions, just make a really good living doing things I enjoy. I’m not gonna worry about seo, pr, links or nuttin. Just work on having sites that, hopefully, others will enjoy, too.
Peace
Cool. Yea I’ve got plans to work two websites over the next couple of weeks as well. I like the topics and am interested in building them up. We’ll see what happens. I’ve also been blogging this site and Tour Squad since the Tour de France is happening. Not much time for any other web building activities.
Thanks for reading.
Good on ya Splork, and I see where Barry is coming from too.
That’s what I always thought and why I self taught myself for my first 4 years online, until I brought myself to purchase a few internet marketing products.
Some were crap but others (eg John Reese) turned out to be amazing and I can see why he enjoys teaching others.
I taught my dad how to make money online so he can quit working for the govt where he was over stressed and under paid. I also taught lots of my friends, and it feels great helping people do well.
And it hasn’t cut into my income because these people have been awesome to joint venture with now that they are doing well online.
Not to mention they often come up with amazing ideas that help me too. Like a brain trust.
So I figure if I teach lots of people to be very successful online, there will be lots of people out there in the world to joint venture with in future.
You know the saying, it’s not what you know, it’s WHO you know.
Also, life isn’t all about money, as Splork says, some of us just like to do something meaningful.
Mark
ps my free blog is at http://www.affilorama.com/blog
I’d like to think that if I manage to make it, I would drag my brother and a few friends along as well. Not much use if you can’t share it.
Rich and I wish you well on your journey, even if our
material does not appear useful to you.
Thanks for contributing to the discussion of what’s
needed to be successful online.
Warm Regards,
Dan Caron
Strategic Profits
Hi Dan. Thanks for dropping by. And thanks for the well wishes despite my disinterest and heavy-handed grind against your program. I mean really, what do I know? You guys sold out in 2 hours. And Rich moves on to a bigger gig at Agora, which is the grail of online publishing. God knows I’ve gotten plenty of their spam.
Thanks for reading.
And might I say I am flabbergasted at the people who read this blog. I honestly thought 7 people might take the time to browse my ramblings. Regardless if I agree with the programs or not, having people like Dan Caron, Mark Ling, and all you other readers, contribute to my blog is simply humbling.
It’s just not that good.
C’mon Splork, don’t talk yourself down.
Get in there and get back to work.
Keep posting, and start succeeding so that others can learn from you! Your income has been growing, albeit slowly, you know you can do it. And I don’t think you give yourself enough credit.
You’ve already learnt a lot this last month and I can’t wait to see your progress over the next few months once you put in practice what you have learnt.
I challenge you to increase your income off your top site by 20% over the next week and then make a post saying how it happened.
Remember I’m here to help!
Mark
Been working. I am looking forward to showing you what I was up to this past weekend. Hopefully you’ll agree that the time spent was worth it. I’ve got a few extra tweaks to make, uploading of all the changes then I’ll send the link over so you can offer a critique. Hopefully I can get everything done tonight.
Hi Splork,
You’d be surprised who reads your blog. Just like Mark was! And Mark dealt with it well.
The reason I read your blog is because you’re a very good writer and you have great dry humour. Sometimes it’s a little ‘Some mothers do ‘ave ‘em’ (I don’t know if you remember that UK TV program) – such as ‘deleting the rewritten article’ post.
But you maintain your humour. I think you should continue writing like this on this blog – maybe move away a little from hammering the gurus, and use your humour and writing ability to focus on your journey and some of the funny things that happen along the way.
But at the same time, keep pointing out what you feel to be ‘bad’ marketing. That’s what makes this blog what it is. If you stopped being ‘a lost ball’ something else would be lost.
It only takes a few good posts and a memorable domain name and the favourites folder isn’t required – it’s stored in the head. And I keep seeing you all over the place recently too.
As Mark said, it’s about self belief and you should believe me when I say I like reading what you write, that’s why I’m here. Keep it up.
Yea, I do need to cool it with grinding the gurus. I just find the lot of them annoying. The marketing tactics, the hype, the prices…it all just ticks me off.
It is an interesting slope I’m on. The more successes I have the less relevant the blog becomes, until one day I imagine I will have worked my way out of the weeds and this blog. I’ll keep it rolling in the mean time. Thanks for reading.
Funnily, I found this posting while searching for anyone else who found it odd to include “server maintenance” in the manifesto. Should “cooking breakfast” have been thrown in, too? Just kidding.
I’m a fan of Rich’s and he can kick your ass when it comes to facing up to what’s really stopping you, and no he’s not lying about the money and the stories. He keeps doing what he’s doing because he’s good at it and there are ALWAYS hungry mouths to be fed.