Catchy title, huh? And that’s lesson number 1. Anyone who can evoke excitement and create a bit of discomfort in how you do your business can catch your attention. They had you at “exposed”. Online marketing myths – it’s about time to bust some beliefs.

Truth is, online marketing is pretty much like all kinds of marketing – you have to try, fail, succeed, tweak, try again. This process alone, as long as you stick with the process, is where online, and in real life, marketing success comes.

The Only Myth To Expose Is “Secrets to Success”

There are NO secrets to success. There are strategies you haven’t learned yet.

The people who have “secrets” to sell to you have failed, failed and failed again until they figured out THEIR formula to online success.

Then they wrapped up those new strategies, with very little exposure to their failures, in a pretty little bow and pitched it to you like it’s a secret.

If there was a secret it wouldn’t last long because it would go like this:

The truth is, dear, that I secretly have been working off 4 hours of sleep at night for 5 years and finally feel like I’m getting somewhere.

Fine, there was a secret EVERY successful entrepreneur wasn’t willing to share. Now you know.

Online “Gurus” Would Be On Infomercials If They Weren’t On The ‘Net

Those with “secrets” to share are smart — they are smart marketers. They are probably serial entrepreneurs who go until something sticks and then go again until they find something else that sticks. Their sticktoitivity is the only lesson you must learn from them. Everything else you can learn with more affordable help or your own trial and error. Because that’s the life of marketing. If they weren’t pitching you as the be-all-end-all expert online, they’d be pitching you on tv. I guarantee it. The model works the same. Exactly the same.

The Online Marketing Model EVERY “SOMEBODY” Is Using:

In other words, those who do this are “selling to you” constantly and probably don’t care much about you or your business. This is tongue-in-cheek. Read it like it’s backwards day or you are yoda. This is not advice. This is what they do that you should  not.

1. Create a niche idea that appeals to the masses. Build it on what they (the customer) say they want — better health, weight loss, more money, younger skin, better “performance”, better and more and better and more and better and more. It is built on what humanity says they want, not on what they need. It’s easier to sell someone who is already convinced, right? Whatever you do, do NOT base it on what they need – ever – because that’s too much work to change the world and people all at the same time.
2. Play emotionally on their tender psyche – the things they cry themselves to sleep about or complaint to their best girlfriends about – and then offer an “impossibly simple” solution that seems so easy it can’t be passed up!
3. Make it a quick fix solution that is unlocked just by following the “Proven” “Trusted” “Million-Dollar” idea that is “Exclusive” “Time Sensitive” “Expiring”. Make it feel special and then tell the audience that they can’t actually have it unless they act really fast or are super special.
4. Price it BEYOND any reasonable, logical amount. Make it feel like it’s only for rich people. But then offer something:
   1. for free to “try it out”
   2. then at a low cost to get a deeper level of “feeling” for the product and just a bit more “exclusive” advice a.k.a. deeper level of commitment to their sales process.
5. Tell them often how lucky they are to know you, planting seeds of inspiration and sprinkling raindrops of happy dust, to create an awesome post-buying experience. Make them feel like a unicorn just pooped a rainbow of Skittles on them. Seriously.
6. And when buyers remorse kicks in – with a knowledge that they felt inspired and empowered and motivated for a little while – when the fairy dust has settled and the unicorn lays broken in the corner with the other new shiny toys, tell them the money they spent was SO worthwhile for the fact they got to know you and relinquishly email them with tantalizing offers for a new bright shiny toy.

Yeah. That’s the model, that’s the myth, and that’s what gives reputable marketing strategies that are based on hard work, time to build a community and brand and awareness a bad name.

What They Don’t Say: The Systems & The Social Are Where You Find Success

That model above is a proven sales model. It can feel cheesy to deliver it and it can feel like you are being sold to. For many it feels great. For me, most of it feels gross.

I’ve tried it to see what it was all about and I just couldn’t mold it to my business to fit me … not yet anyway. Never say never, but until that model feels valuable for both my community and clients (and me) I am not doing it! Needless to say, I haven’t gotten rich quick. But I have something FAR better, a brand and a community base that grows and sticks with me – the marketing dream!

What bothers me about the online version of infomercials is that those pitching their products successfully this way ARE millionaires. Okay that doesn’t bother me. Good for them.

What does bother me is that they are millionaires not because of WHAT they are pitching but HOW – which is rarely revealed. The how is not marketing magic – it is systems, technology and time saving tools that are incredibly savvy with that push product and pull people in with a magician’s slight of hand flair.

By the time a client finds me — because hey, I know my guru status is only on the rise and I’ve yet to “arrive” — they’ve spent more dollars signing up for programs and traveling to workshops than they’d ever dream to have again of INVESTING IN THEIR BUSINESS SYSTEMS AND MARKETING!

Colour me frustrated and very, very sad for them.

But the good news is, lack of budget and a few bruised egos something I totally welcome helping you overcome.

Here’s a Truth: How To Make Money Online

Your online money making lesson is not going to happen overnight. It takes years to hone, but it starts with some great decisions on your part to start. And it starts from taking what is amazing about the gross sales model and making it work in an authentic, value-driven manner. And know this, you don’t have to have online product to make money online. You also don’t need a faked-up e-book or a series of classes with imaginary valuation (if you are going to put information products on your website – make them SING your brand with meaty content that makes your clients want more). Your “make money online” strategy is more about BEING online, than selling online:

1. Create a niche that appeals to an audience you care about. Build it on what they say they want — attract them based on what they already know they need.
2. But teach them what they don’t know as part of the process. That’s where you prove your value and become distinct.
3. Use emotional connection to create an appeal – your emotional commitment to your solution – not an emotional blackmail.
4. Build systems online and in your real life customer service that makes the HOW you deliver your business seamless.
5. Be humble and honest if you make a mistake (you will). Your humanity and honesty will differentiate you. I promise.
6. Be consistently raising the stakes on how savvy you are in knowing marketing and how to sell your own business. Hire help if you need it. Accept failure as a stepping stone to the next success.
7. Build a community-minded attitude first and foremost. The sales will come. An online community that substantiates a real life community experience is perfect! If you just have an online community, devote yourself to being a savvy, frequent and available community champion. This creates trust in you and proves you care. And it lasts – it can last the entire lifetime of your business. Guess what – the gurus started there — with 5 Facebook friends, no Twitter followers and a blog that nobody read. Normal.
8. Have SOMETHING to sell. If you have nothing to sell you can’t make money online. Do you have your own sales strategy ? One that fits you and nobody else? Is it available online – easily understood, accessed and fulfilled? It should be.

Work hard. Try and fail. And do it on your own time because now you know how.

That SYSTEM thing:

• Learn the capabilities of your website and an email marketing manager and put it to work – regular communication through newsletters, blog articles and auto-responders (automatic replies to someone immediately and over time when they join your “list”).
• Have free offers or ways to get to know you, try you, learn from you for free first available by “subscription” on your site but not in a cheesy sales pitch. Sophisticated use of your tools is fine, but slick and unfulfilling when all is said and done is not fine. Create value and build a fan base. Value can be created with a blog, a free paper with new and helpful insight, an exclusive video, something they receive in the mail — anything as long as it is valuable and unique to your brand.
• Don’t feel pressured to create “product” online to build an online business model. Use your online presence – from web to social media community building – to drive real life sales. But use your website to make it easy to sign up, join, pay you.
• Build systems around follow up and customer service for your online inquiries – make it easy to contact you. Do not bury your email address and use forms. Do not hide who you actually are and make you seem unaccessible. People are lazy and have low trust. Make it easy to like and trust YOU.
• Create marketing processes – create an editorial calendar for your year about what you are going to do, what you are going to say and repeat HOW you do both of those things every single month. Use automated tools (like scheduling in Hootsuite) with limited but very pragmatic, goal-driven purpose.
• A successful system is something that you CAN do, WANT to do and UNDERSTAND HOW to do well enough that you will repeat it. Repeating systems saves you time and money and stress and frustration and…. (I don’t need to go on do I?).

Learn more from me- try the myth that advertising is dead.

Or try this guru who happens to be worth every minute you could spend with him, he’s the real deal- Seth Godin: How To Make Money Online

Share! Do you have systems that work? Have you bought into a myth and learned anything from it? Any gurus you admire that are not infomercial sleazy and truly add value? I would love to know them — like I say, I like smart marketing just not sleazy sales pitches that some gurus take. What is the online marketing myth you want to expose?