I’ve had just an awful week.  I had to put my 14 year old puppy down on Tuesday and that alone is bad enough.  then me and my son were terribly sick with the flu for the rest of the week. My Internet was down for 24 hours and finally by email was down all weekend. – YIKES!

But I press on. and no more doom or gloom.

The Latest Product Launches:

Right on the heels of Frank Kern’s latest launch were 2 equally promoted launches.

The first was PPC classroom and the other was Ewen Chia’s book.  This shows you without a doubt that this style of product launch works. They both sound like decent products, and the bonuses for Ewen’s book that people were giving away made it seem like a no brainer. Unfortunately my to-do list is so long rihght now I did not really have time for either at this point.

Another launch that made some waves this past week was something that I think actually will benefit a lot of people. It’s a membership called EasilyAnswered.com and it’s unlike anything that I have ever seen.

For $97 month, you basically get access to a slew of top notch Internet marketers. This is a question and answers type of membership.  You ask your questions and the experts will respond – simple enough.

I wish I could remember all the names, but people I HIGHLY REGARD like Willie Crawford, Kevin Riley, Ross Goldberg are all on board.  Really if you need a regular amount of help then join. I don’t have a link as i am not promoting it, but seriously if you need it you won’t do better.

I made my first sale from the blog I created for Ed Dales 30 day challenge so that was cool.  I never finished the challenge as i really chose a bad topic for where the course went.  If I had known where the daily lessons were leading to when i started i would have chosen something else. But I did choose an awesome topic that is now listed highly in the search engines based on what I learned. Now I just need to monitize it better.

I was able to get 3 Squidoo lenses made this week, 2 in a new niche I am sort of excited about. Hopefully those start to bring in some traffic soon.

Wow, the frenzy over Frank Kern’s latest release of Mass Control was insane.

I received a ton of emails form a lot of marketers trying to get a commission on that product.  Just like traffic or even a television, once the noise gets too loud I just have to either turn it off, block it out or leave.

Don’t get me wrong, because I think Frank Kern is a genius at marketing his products. The guy is definitely cool.

So I didn’t buy, but they did get me last time around. It’s a pretty decent product. If you are already familiar with Dan Kennedy and Gary Halbert you probably don’t need Mass Control anyway.  But then if you are using Dan Kennedy or Gary Halbert’s stuff, then you have enough cash to buy Mass Control anyway.

So where am I going with this?

Well first if you are doing a product launch using top affiliates to promote your offer know that you are going to turn a bunch of people off – but that’s a small tradeoff for what you will make.

Second, I see Frank did not offer this course for only the cost of shipping with a monthly membership like last time. This time it was all up front baby. That makes me wonder if he got too many cancellations from the last launch.

There’s a lot to learn from watching a launch from a guru and then subsequent launches, you can see where they have been and where they are going.  Use that to your advantage, but protect your hearing, it gets pretty loud at times.

To your success!

Rupps

Technorati Tags: Dan Kennedy, Frank Kern, Gary Halbert, Mass Control, product launch

A few months back I made a post on the best Internet marketing books on all time. This was based on a survey over at the Warriors forum. I also listed what I thought were the best books.

One of the books suggested over and over was The 4 Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferriss.  I have heard of the book, but never read it. So based on the suggestion, I headed over to Amazon and bought myself a copy.

Luckily this book had an audio version on CD. I like listening to such things in my car so I know this was the version for me.

The audio book came in a set of 7 CD’s. In no time I loaded them and started to listen to them.  I have now listened to them two times and I must say I am impressed, however I also have my criticisms.

My main criticism is that the book goes all over the map and while it does cover Internet marketing, that’s not really the main topic. It’s really about obtaining a life style change. A complete lifestyle change.

Timothy Ferriss is quite the remarkable person having spent time in many countries enjoying a lifestyle many can hardly even dream of.

The book covers how Timothy was able to create his business and outsource nearly all the tasks.  The section on outsourcing alone is a god enough reason to go buy the book. He gives good advice for choosing what types of things to sell and how to negotiate with your vendors. Highly recommended are information products, which I am sure comes as no surprise.

A good portion of the book is about how to start travelling and see the world. Places to go, how to spend your days and how to handle living like the “New Rich” as he coins the term.

Although I don’t really think of this as one of the best Internet marketing books of all times, it has made an immense impact on meand how I now look at things. To say I high;y recommend this book is an understatement.

The resources on all sorts of topics from outsourcing and tools to make your business and life easier to travel-related resources alone make this a must-have.

Head over to Amazon and get The 4-Hour Workweek now.

Technorati Tags: The 4 Hour Work Week Review, Tim Ferriss, timothy Ferriss

Well after the Holiday rush I can breath a little easier and get back to the 30 Day challenge.

Obviously I am not meeting my deadlines, but what I have learned so far is nothing short of outstanding. Ed Dale and Dan Raine really outdid themselves creating this free course.

I just imported this blog into the WPDirect interface. I had to manually install the plug-ins but that was pretty easy to do. Next I’ll fix some of the posts and start playing with some of the uber cool content software.

I’ll continue to keep you updated.

Wishing you the best in 2009!

Technorati Tags: 30 Day Challenge, blog, blogging, Ed Dale, website planning, WPDirect

Will you act during the economic downturn, or simply REACT?

Don’t let fear of the recession guide your goal setting
plans for 2009. This is a BIG mistake…!

Fear is an emotional response, only good for short-term
survival.

When you’re in “fight or flight” mode, you’re not thinking
clearly about the path you’re running… You’re just RUNNING!

So your efforts lack strategy, planning, and insight.

I want you to do more than just survive 2009.

Internet shopping is predicted to hit $145.1 Billion in
the coming year, a significant 14% increase — despite the
recession!

Consumers will be spending more time at home, using their
computers for everything from bargain hunting and product
research to upgrading skills.

Studies show this shift is ALREADY well underway…!

I don’t want the Big “R” to stop you from pursuing exciting
personal, financial, and business goals in 2009, so I’ve
arranged to get you exclusive VIP access to an important
video that Internet marketing legend Derek Gehl just put up
on his site.

Derek’s been successfully selling on the Internet for over
a decade now, and he’s brought in over $100 MILLION in sales…

… so he’s by far the BEST person to advise you about how
to thrive in ANY market.

When you watch his FREE Goal Setting Video, you’ll discover
how you can make 2009 your richest year yet:

http://www.internetmarketing.com/2009-goals

Wishing you health, wealth, and happiness in 2009!

-Rupps

P.S. Derek’s also going to be hosting a FREE Webinar in the
first week of January to help everyone kick-off their New
Year’s goals with a bang.

You can register for it here:
http://www.internetmarketing.com/2009-goals

I would like to wish all our visitors a Very Merry Christmas.

Love, Peace and Joy came down on earth on Christmas day to make you happy and cheerful. May Christmas spread cheer in your lives!

I just found this story on Carl Galettis website that I want to share.  Please take the time to read it. It really puts things into perspective:

The Christmas Story of 1881

Time for me to go on another rant.

I’ve been busy enough these days so when I take the time to check out an offer, I don’t like being mislead.

Twice this week I spent some time checking out free offers. The first was from a not-so-well known marketer. Let’s call him an up-coming marketing guru. Well luckily for me since I am on his email list and it is Chrismas after all I get this free gift report. He is going to reveal to me how he makes his butt load of money. Ok, I can certainly understand hyping everything – all the top marketers do it. Unfortunately he blew it big time. This over-loaded free gift report is nothing but a big sales letter.

What a waste of my time. 2 points taken away from Griffendor for that one.

People if you are going to give away a free gift make sure it’s a useful gift. I have better things to do than read 38 pages of why I should buy your product.

The other supposed freebie was buy one of the current top gurus. Should I mention his name? Hmm …. thinking… thinking.. I hesitate because his stuff is really good. Ok, I’ll spill the beans. It’s Mike Filsaime.

Mike has a new product out called “Instant Affiliate Website”. And you know what? It looks like a really, really good product. So what’s my gripe? It’s supposed to be free. That’s how it was being represented. First I signed up to be notified when it was going to be available. Yesterday I ghot the email that said I was going to get Instant Affiliate Website free.

I already know how good his stuff is so I took the time to check it out, watch the ever-too-long video and then proceed to get me free website. Guess what? It’s not bleeping free at all. Technically it’s free when you subscribe to his paid newsletter at $39.95 per month.

Now to be fair, you can test drive the newsletter for only $4 shipping in order to get your gift. YOu’ll have to cancel or you will keep getting billed every month.

Bottom line is that this product does look like it is worth it, I just felt a little mislead. Also I did get another email after the first that said:
“You get ALL THIS as a free trial to my print monthly newsletter that I will send to you for free too. Just tell me where to ship it and pay the small s&h charge.” But the first email (the one I responded to) said nothing of the sort. Perhaps he noticed this and sent the second to fix that.

Hey, it looks like something to try. So I am giving it my thumbs-up to try, but I am not giving an affiliate link to the product – I am sure you ahev enough of them anyways.

Have a Merry Christmas folks! Jesus Rocks!

Even after all the hype, all my mentors, all the gurus – they all extoll the virtues of Twitter I just could get it, but I am coming around. You see, it is a distraction. It takes me away from getting things done – why would I want that distraction. I am finding out that it is a great way to share information – way better than a blog for immediately sharing information. The problem is you share information and then it’s gone. It’s an immediate results thing. Another thing that is happening is my followers list is growing faster than my posts alone would indicate, because I do not post much. But the more people who follow you, the more access to other people you get. People like to follow people that other people are following and on and on. So my list at this point is growing by only a few people a day where a couple of weeks ago it was only a few a week. We will see where it goes from here. If you would like to follow me, my twitter name is Rupps http://twitter.com/Rupps

Technorati Tags: Marketing on Twitter, Twitter

Howdy Folks,

I can’t believe Christmas is almost here. I did already start my Christmas shopping which I normally delay until a couple of days before Christmas, so at least I am ahead of schedule on something.

I’ve been busy, busy, busy putzing around on some different projects. I never did complete Ed Dales 30 day challenge, however just by getting to day 10 or so, I got an awesome website started that made the number one spot on Yahoo and the #4 on Google for my main keywords! Simply Incredible.

And to be honest I think I got to those top spots by the information given for only day 6 or 7. It’s a great course, but the type of site I chose to build is really beyond what the course is designed for. I should have chosen a different topic. So I will most likely start another website and go through the course sometime hopefully in the near future.

So what’s with the site I created? Well I won’t go into specifics, but it’s selling hard goods which is and always has been my meal ticket. As great as selling info products is, for me selling hard items on websites and ebay has simply been working tremendously. The site needs a lot of work and I had to take a break as my other sites keep me really busy before Christmas. Orders keep pouring in and I am too stubborn to outsource product fulfillment as I am extremely particular about how things get sent out. Everything from how the items are packaged to getting them out the door ASAP I need to get done unless I am using drop-shippers which frankly drives me nuts.

As convenient as using drop shippers is (no inventory, initial lay-out of cash, etc), there is a huge drawback when it comes to reliability. Stuff I inventory gets sent out right away. Drop shippers seem to take all the time they want. This can be up to a week to get a package sent out. And if they are out of stock on an item and I don’t get notified for a few days that does not sit well with a customer who needs an item and finds out days later that I can’t get it to them. Then of course I need to credit their charge cards .. grrrr
/end rant

But business has been good. With the economy in a recession I am not sure if sales are down over previous years or not. It probably is down a little, but not significantly. I should know by the end of the month in either case.

A new thing I have been working on is another 30 day project. This one is a product creation course. Everyday you get to watch some videos and get a homework assignment which leads you step-by-step to creating your very own info product. So far it’s been simply awesome. Most things I have been doing through the years, however the instructor Kevin Riley puts some unique twists and insights in things which not only teaches you how to do everything, but it also keeps you on track and focused.

Unfortunately, I am way behind on that as well with my time being devoted to fulfilling product sales. Also the topic I chose for this product creation course is also something that is maybe a little too much. I’ll let you in on this one. Hopefully by letting the cat out of the bag, that will encourage me to finish.

It’s a guitar learning info product which will be video based. I think it’s going to take me longer to do this than writing an ebook. I still need to write nearly everything out I am going to say on video, although it does not have to be polished writing. There will also be a book that the customer will get in addition to the videos. But the slow part is I really need to brush up on my guitar playing. I need to get in better form before I can start shooting video.

Once I finish the course, I will make it available to others as well. So take this as advance knowledge that an awesome product creation course will be available by me soon.

January will be another busy month as I try to catch-up on all these delayed projects. Hopefully I have more to share with you then.

Until then take care! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

- Rupps

I have been going through Ed Dale’s 30 Day Challenge and I must say I am extremely impressed.

The 30 day challenge is a step-by-step guide that will take you from not knowing a thing about building a web business to making your first sale online. At least that is somewhat how Ed describes it.

However it is WAYYY more than that. If all he was trying to do is to get you to make your first sale online, I am sure he could have made it more like a 7 day challenge.

No, what this is really about is learning the latest and greatest methods of building a Real business. This is without a doubt the most complete step-by-step directions I have run across on the latest strategies of building a site and building sustainable traffic. The best part is that it’s free. While there is some software that he uses that does cost money, he describes no-cost ways to go as well.

While I will stick with my recommendation on the Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on the Internet by Derek Gehl as the best course to building your real Internet business as it describes in depth the “how, what and why” things work and don’t work, Ed Dale’s 30 Day Challenge used by itself WILL make you not only your first sale, but it will also build your confidence on how to make sales online. Used in combination with a thorough course such as Insiders Secrets, you have a deadly combination.

The only drawback? Completing this in 30 Days. I will admit I am way behind and should have been done a week ago. At my rate (being the Putz that I am), I won’t get done for another couple of weeks.

My conclusion is that you need to go through this challenge and I do not care what level you are on – YOU WILL LEARN something that you did not know. This challenge is taking me further and faster than anything else.

Click here to join in for FREE

Technorati Tags: 30 day challenge review