Lesson 1: Market Research
March 20, 2009
Lessons from a 30 yr Old Finger Painter
by Michael J. Alaniz
As our Mastermind Group ventures further into the world of online marketing, one of the most important discoveries we have made is the necessity for Market Research. The largest mistake an online marketer/entrepreneur can make is to create a product or service without first asking a few important questions.
First, is this niche a large enough market? and second, is there a problem in this niche where my product or service would be able to solve it? This is where Market Research can save you lots of money and more importantly, time!
The Two Must-Ask Market Research Questions:
1. Is This Niche Large Enough?
Just for fun, let’s say there is an entrepreneur who has expertise in the area of finger painting. They decide to create a product that will teach people how to do self-portraits using their thumbs and the color blue. This is something they really enjoy doing and since all their family and friends comment about how great the paintings look, they’re sure it will be a hit.
So this entrepreneur immediately goes to work, first securing a domain and then creating their product. Once they finish, they send out an e-mail to their friends and family to spread the word about your their new product. Two weeks go by and then two month…but still no sales!
This is where market research could have saved time, money and some lost confidence. If our online marketer had taken the time to survey the internet for blogs, forums and websites, they would have quickly seen how large (or how small!) the finger painting community is. From here they would have a better understanding of what this niche is up to and what they’re currently buying.
So how big should a niche be?
There is no right or wrong answer to this, but if the community/market you want to sell only has a couple of forums, blogs and websites then you can’t expect to make a large amount of money. The simple concept is the bigger the audience, the bigger the chance for making sales. Now keep in mind this also has to be a market that spends money, but we’ll touch more on that in another article.
2. Does my Product/Service Solve a Problem?
This is the biggest lesson I have personally learned so far. Instead of wasting valuable time trying to think of products, the best thing to remember is “the market has already spoken.” This means each niche has already expressed what it wants, it just takes time and research to find out what this is.
Thanks to blogs and forums, we now have the ability to survey the opinions of a market place. You can accomplish this by going into any forum, read the posts and ask yourself the following questions:
“what are the reoccurring themes?”
“are there any problems people keep mentioning?”
“what specific topics are continually talked about?’
The answer to these questions should be the foundation to your product/service. That’s it! This is what makes market research so powerful. It is basically mind-reading your audience.
So the next time you find yourself sitting around trying to think of the “Next Big Thing,” simply remember “the market has already spoken.” Your job is to simply listen and answer these problems with a solution.
Thanks for taking the time to read my ramblings. Don’t feel bad if you feel overwhelmed with your personal online journey, because we feel the same way at times!! But this is allot of fun, so lets learn together.
Please feel free to comment on this article, let us know what you think and how you approach market research. We’d love to hear from you.
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A Mastermind with Bryan Elliott of ASN
January 3, 2009
While Bartending (my night job) a Private Party, I was introduced to Bryan Elliott, the founder of Action Sports Network. I quickly decided that we needed to pick Bryan’s brain so we could learn as much from him as possible.
We set up an Interview with Bryan and the rest of the gang to learn more about him and his marketing experience. We were surprised to see how he has harnessed the power of Social Media to create a following of 900+ members in just under three months. And it was this past December that he held his FIRST Live Event for his Networking Group: So-Cal Action Sports Network. This group consists of CEO’s, Small Business Owners, Marketing Directors and other Entrepreneurs who fall into the Market of “Action Sports.” This includes anything from Surf & Skate apparel to energy drinks and music.
What We Learned From Bryan:
In just one hour of interviewing Bryan, we were able to grab some pretty powerful stuff! But what amazed us the most was Bryan’s humility. Although he founded Action Sports Network and built it from the ground up, he does not seek power or credit for his accomplishments. Instead, he looks at himself as a servant of the Networking Group, and that the real focus is on the members and where THEY want to take ASN.
It is this attitude and mindset that one MUST have in order to be successful with Social Media. Put your group and members first. Listen to their wants and needs and simply fulfill them.
Bryan Elliott used LinkedIn to obtain over 900 members in under three months. We are all excited to see what he will accomplish in 2009.
Bryan will be featured on our Webisode Series: realityMASTERMIND which will be debuting this Spring 2009! Watch out for him, and many other EXPERTS who are helping us along the path as we go from zeros to Internet Marketing Heros!
The Mastermind-Mindset: A Lesson in Thought-Shifting
December 2, 2008
On our never-ending quest for achieving the “Internet Lifestyle,” this past Monday we met with Success-Coach & Mentor Pam Ragland, who taught us a little about thought-shifting and removing Success Blocks!
Starting a new Business Venture on a relatively new medium (The Internet), we had NO IDEA that we had pre-conceived beliefs in our Sub-Conscious. Personally, growing up with parents who worked extremely hard for every penny they earned, I have always correlated “making money” and “success” with HARD WORK!
Pam was the first to point out that a thought like that is simply not an Absolute Truth and can actually hold you back on your path to Success. This whole idea of eliminating “limiting beliefs” was really intriguing to all of us, because we realized it was the power of the Internet that is really able to eliminate this “Old Way” of thinking.
The Power of The Internet
We really are in a time of Incredible Change! If you have read books such as The World is Flat and The 4-Hour Workweek, you know just what I am talking about. For the first time in history, WE ALL have the ability to empower ourselves with the knowledge and skills to build a business and change the World!
My autoresponder will automatically send e-mails to subcribers while my Virtual Assistants in the Philippines are bookmarking my blog posts and performing draining data-entry tasks. In the meantime, I am talking in real-time with my programmer in India as he works on my new website. That of course, which leaves me to do what I love doing most: …nothing!
Pam’s advice was eye-opening and very inspiring. She asked great questions that caused us to second-guess these beliefs that we all had about work, success and life. “Why does work have to be hard?” “Do you want to spend the rest of your life working 16 hour days? Is that your definition of Success?”
I pass on a bit of Pam’s wisdom and advice to you now: Next time you sit down to tackle an assignment, whether it is writing a blog post, creating a new product, or cleaning your room, ask yourself “How can I make this process as effortless as possible?” Chances are, you shouldn’t be working as hard as you are!
Pam Ragland will be featured as a guest on realityMASTERMIND when it airs in the Spring of 2009. In the meantime, you can learn more at www.PamRagland.com & www.AskPamRagland.com. Get on her list and tune in to her FREE UStream Calls every Tuesday!
Mastermind Word Jumble
November 23, 2008
We stumbled upon a really cool website that let us create a word jumble for Free! Check out Wordle at www.Wordle.net and get started on your Word Jumble today!
To create ours, all five of us sat down and started coming up with words that described what realityMASTERMIND meant to us. The picture below is the result of what this project is for us. And we just thought we would share this cool picture with you. Enjoy!
Mastermindism #61: No Stupid Questions-Just Stupid People!
November 11, 2008
There is no such thing as a Stupid Question…just Stupid People! Well, if you have properly screened your Mastermind Members before allowing them to join, you won’t have the problem of working with people that are at a low caliber. Therefore, you should encourage your members to not hold anything back! Whether it is an idea, a comment or question, never judge or criticize. What you may first see as a “stupid idea,” may spark something genius! It is all about letting the creativity flow freely and comfortably through the room and your members. With that in mind, never hesitate when something is on your mind for fear the group might judge you.
The Greatest MASTERMIND Ever Formed
November 11, 2008
In this video, I uncover the GREATEST Mastermind ever created in the history of time. Napoleon Hill first coined the word back in the first quarter of the 1900’s with his timeless classic Think and Grow Rich (Have you read The Laws of Success?!) and since then, business-folk and other creative minds all over the World have harnessed the power of the Mastermind to accomplish unbelievable things. Well, in starting my own Mastermind Group, I took it upon myself to uncover the greatest Mastermind group of all time so I could have a perfect model to emulate.
THIS video is all about the BEST of the BEST! This is the GREATEST Mastermind ever created…ever!
The (Go-Kart) Track to Success & Internet Riches
November 8, 2008
While we did end up “Racing for Pinks,” our initial intention for coming to an Indoor Go-Kart Track was to attend our monthly Orange County Internet Marketing Meet-Up group. Michael and I were fortunate enough to present our “realityMastermind Concept” to the group, but we also opened our doors to invite more “Guest-Masterminders” to brainstorm with us at our meetings.
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The Result:
We had a ton of successful Marketers approach us asking to be apart of the project. We are so excited to be working with others who are willing to share their ideas and help us learn and grow.
What We Have for YOU:
The dynamic of our Mastermind meetings has simply been incredible! Having a guest come in and join us all day has been truely remarkable (mainly because we really don’t know what we are doing!) I would love to extend the invitation to YOU and ask that you come and join us on our show.
The Benefits of Masterminding with Us:
- You get to hang out with a couple of cool guys
- We will promote you & your website
- You will be featured on our TV Show
- You’ll get that funny feeling inside knowing that you are making an impact on our lives
- …and we may just teach you a thing or two (though highly doubtful)
Please Contact us if you are interested in becoming one of our Guest-Masterminders by filling out the Contact Form on our website.
Planes, Trains & Autoresponders!
November 6, 2008
If ever there were a misleading blog post, this would probably be it! So, let’s see if I can make this post tie into the title and make it all relevant.
This past week we had yet another successful Mastermind Meeting! Six hours of intense learning, brain-storming and idea-swapping can really fly by! But this meeting was special because we brought with us a Guest-Masterminder!
Guest Masterminder: Dave “RC” Powers
We were so blessed to have Dave with us this past weekend for so many reasons. For starters, he assured me that: YES! Money can be made online outside of the Internet Marketing or Business Opportunity niche. (Phew!)
Dave Powers is the creator of RCPowers.com and he designs, builds, & flies anything and everything remote controlled that can fly (Hey, like PLANES!) He is contacted by the largest RC companies month after month where they ask him to build their planes and take video of him flying them! I know what you are thinking, and the answer is Yes! Dave gets paid Big Bucks to fly around toy airplanes for a living! Anything is possible!
But Dave is so unique because he never really learned Internet Marketing from the Gurus. He didn’t purchase some big course and follow it step-by-step. THIS GUY DOESN’T EVEN HAVE AN AUTORESPONDER! Instead, he just had a true PASSION for something he loved (playing with toy planes) and he continued to work at it.
Today, his biggest success comes from YOUTUBE where he is Constantly rated in the Top 5 of the Science & Technology Category and he gets a minimum of 50,000 views a day! He is killin’ it!
But you want to know the coolest thing? When he left at the end of our meeting, he actually thanked us! He thought our meeting was really informative and constructive and he walked away with a big to-do list for getting his business to the next level!
Some Quick Lessons from Dave:
I wouldn’t dare write a post without giving some great Take-Away Content that you could use in your business. Although we learned sooo much from him in 6 hours that it is impossible to write it all down here, I want to give some great bullet points.
1. Build The 2-Way Relationship!
Dave’s list was build through Subscribers on Youtube, not a traditional autoresponder. Although this is not recommended, he is able to go in and look at his subscribers and learn a lot from them by the videos they post and the views they enjoy. He is taking the time to get to know them, and he creates his videos, webpages, etc based on what his customers want.
He also encourages questions from his customers. These questions (which he takes the time to answer himself) formulate the next steps in his business. Your customer will tell you exactly what they are looking for without even knowing it! You have to do more than just listen to your customers, you have to deliver!!
2. Find Something & Stick With it:
Dave defined Social Media with an analogy of planting several seeds in a garden: You won’t see the immediate effects right away, but if you water them regularly, eventually you will see that growth. Even more so, you may notice that some areas of your garden are growing incredibly while some areas quickly die. Don’t continue to spread yourself too thin in areas that lack growth. Instead, focus on your award-winning plants: give them the attention they need to prosper even further. For Dave, his Prize Crop was YOUTUBE. What’s your prize crop?
3. Rapport-Building
And finally, Dave stressed the fact that the reason he has remained successful is that his customers know and trust him. He has the patience to take the time and build rapport with everyone in his community. When he recommends a company’s RC Plane he spends hours doing research on that company. He then puts each product through rigorous tests before he even brings it to the public on YouTube. He has never promoted a bad product, and has never had an angry, unsatisfied customer. Remember, news spreads fast on this thing called the Internet, it is up to you if you want that to be good or bad news.
About Dave Powers
To find out more information about Dave and his amazing ability to utilize YouTube, check out
www.RCPowers.com
RCPowers YouTUBE Pag
RCSPowers.ScottL@gmail.com
P.S. I ended up never mentioning anything about TRAINS in this post, and for that I apologize.
Our Mastermind-isms
November 4, 2008
This 6-month journey is just one big Learning Experience. Not only are we learning about Internet Marketing, our limitations, and building a business, but we are also figuring out how to successfully utilize the power of a MASTERMIND.
We have decided to dedicate a portion of our website to sharing with everyone a bit of our knowledge (as we learn it) on just exactly what is working to create this special dynamic in the group.
If you are not already apart of a Mastermind, we encourage you to either start or join one. We will continue to post our little words of wisdom (Mastermind-isms) as we go along this whole process. We hope that we can help you create and manage the most effective Mastermind as possible!
Start Browsing our Mastermind-isms Here:
What is realityMASTERMIND? A Step Closer
October 30, 2008
Here is a quick little video we just threw together to answer some more questions, and let people know what they can expect in the next few weeks.
We got the group together in Michael’s hometown in Pasadena and actually snuck into a CULT Church grounds to film. The problem was the sound was really bad, so we will be doing a lot more videos like this in the near future with better quality! I promise!
A Closer Look at realityMASTERMIND:
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