Lyndsay Phillips knows all about content marketing and wants you to use whatever tool fits your personality, whether that's blogging, videos, or podcasting. Ideally, you should blog weekly, use social media three times per day, publish one weekly video, and podcast every two weeks or so. She shares many content strategies and hacks to get the most of your day and your business. For example, an easy method for most people is to simply carve out that time in the calendar for content creation.
Listen in as Shannon shares content ideas with us (benefits, drawbacks, why vs. alternatives), how to pace yourself, stay in alignment, and attract the right people into your business.
Catchphrase of the Week: Content Piggy Bank: What Would It Take For You to Record Just One Quick Video Per Day? Resource of Week: X-Mirage to mirror iphone/ipad and record it on your computer Quote of the Week: "If you cannot do great things, do small things in a great way." -- Napoleon Hill Quote of the Week #2: "Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day-in and day-out." -- Robert Collier Quote of the Week #3: "Don't wish it was easier. Wish you were better." -- Jim Rohn Become Better: 30 minutes to say something that could be said in 1 minute?
System & Routine
1. Small goals: 10-minute spurts or 500-word days. Create a sense of urgency to avoid Parkinson's Law (and possibly run a countdown timer) 2. Update an editorial calendar so you know what you're writing each day (Seinfeld productivity where you want to "avoid the broken chain of events") 3. Use writer's block to perform more research 4. Wake up an hour earlier (Elmore Leonard)
Tools & Mechanics
5. Delegate transcription and speak it out instead (MakeAProduct.com) 6. Use Google image search to find relevant images (don't forget to source them) 7. Grab a YouTube video and explain your reaction to it (before or against) 8. Break down pages into paragraphs, into talking points + time
Mind Hacks
9. Read a lot 10. Unplug distractions 11. Write your chapter/article titles as questions and paragraphs as questions, then delete the questions later (record yourself and send questions and answers to yourself via instant messenger) 12. Use a daily prompt 13. Break up your monotonous routine: go for a drive, walk, swim, run 14. Combine a task you don't like to do with one you do like to do, i.e. Write a quick blog post by the pool 15. Set a fake meeting schedule on your calendar and use the time for yourself
Bonus: Toughen Up That Writing
Avoid "ing"... say "set" instead of "setting"
Repetitions: remove "click here" every 2 sentences. "Please" every 2 sentences.
Words to stop using: Try, start -- Trick, loophole, hacked -> secret -- Work, learn -> discover, uncover
Tone down these words: Money-back/refund
Words to use: System, formula, roadmap, blueprint, Machine, Push button, Secret weapon, Magic bullet
Quote of the Day: "You cannot be both young and wise. Young people who pretend to be wise to the ways of the world are mostly just cynics. Cynicism masquerades as wisdom, but it is the farthest thing from it. Because cynics don’t learn anything. Because cynicism is a self-imposed blindness, a rejection of the world because we are afraid it will hurt us or disappoint us. Cynics always say no. But saying “yes” begins things. Saying “yes” is how things grow. Saying “yes” leads to knowledge. “Yes” is for young people. So for as long as you have the strength to, say “yes'." -- Stephen Colbert
Thought of the Day: Is internet marketing a scam? Yes, if you believe that going in. Classic fear of success, self sabotage, self-fulfulling prophecy
Nine Rules of Content Creation
Questions Must Be Answered: so if you're stuck, answer a series of questions (asked TO you by one single imaginary person) that lead to the end
Solution: Fix a real problem that the marketplace is asking about, and lead to a call-to-action if possible
WWHW: Why, What, How-To, What-If (the basis for any start-to-finish piece of content)
One-Take Content: write (or talk in video) the way you would in everyday conversation (no "fancy talk")
Mindmap: rearrange to figure out the categories, hierarchy, and sequence of what you're explaining
Notes: Have bullet points in front of you to keep yourself on track, don't leave things out, and unpack in the correct order, but don't script anything
Content Muscle: the more you put out blog posts, podcasts, webinars, and videos... the easier they become
Content Piggy Bank: instead of living paycheck-to-paycheck, record more than you need and schedule it out
Demo or Magic Trick: show what you're building towards, explain what you're about to show, show that thing, and show it again
Be sure to grab our Make a Product course to up your game with content creation and self-publish your own book (on Kindle and CreateSpace) in just 56 minutes.
"You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future." -- Steve Jobs "A real decision is meausred by the fact that you've taken a new action. If there's no action, you haven't truly decided." -- Tony Robbins
Criteria for updating a course you're selling:
Has it be at least 1 year since I launched this?
Is it still selling, or have sales dropped off slightly? (as I'm promoting it heavily?)
Is there something new I'd change in each module of this course?
Is there a new sexy hook I can add to justify this new course? (examples: transcripts for videos, tools/templates, coaching calls using TimeTrade)
Tune in to today's Robert Plank Show where we talk about taking action and how to decide between the "product launch frenzy" versus income streams that make you money for years to come...
Dave Koziel from PublishWithDave.com is going to tell us how he makes $10,000 to $30,000 per month from Amazon Kindle. He's created 60 to 80 Kindle books (6,000 to 12,000 words in length) for $80-$150.
Some books produce hundreds per month while even the "duds" generate $20-$25 per month. He's going to share not only his numbers and "ah-ha" moments, but his secret strategies for making money with Amazon Kindle publishing. (As well as CreateSpace physical books and ACX Audible audiobooks.) Topics covered:
How to make money with Amazon Kindle without writing any of your own books (Dave only wrote two of his own books, for fun)
How even an underforming book (6,000 to 12,000 words in length) makes Dave about $25 per month and can make as many as hundreds of dollars per month (so how many books like these would you outsource?)
The secret to getting Amazon buyers off Amazon and onto your list
How to get started with that first Kindle book
Get more reviews from your Amazon books using review swaps
Let's talk today about "business card" books to build your business. You should get your best ideas down, and re-use (even sometimes repeating yourself) your best content, especially in the form of digital and physical books. Amazon lets you publish an unlimited number books, so you might as well make the most of it.
Marketer of the Week: Jeff Mills (be the salesman -- best salesman for an app creator but he didn't even make the product)
Quote of the Week: "When you focus on problems, you'll have more problems. When you focus on possibilities, you'll have more opportunities." -- Unknown
Catchphrase of the week: "Don't live life with one foot on the brake." Comfort zone, money zone. Nobody likes a backseat driver.
Thought of the week: What if you just put 10 minutes a day into that goal? Put aside $10 a day to build your business? Read just 1 page from a book per day?
This is how I automate my posting of social media... I can post an entry to my blog and it cross-posts to my Facebook fan page... but THEN replicates to Twitter, my other Facebook fan pages, and my personal Facebook wall. I also have triggers that go off when I upload a YouTube video:
You can connect all kinds of cool stuff. For example, send me a text message reminder at the same time every day, or populate a Google spreadsheet when I add a file to Dropbox, and more:
I'm finally starting to get it. The newbie mindset (or clarity mindset). Your training should "lean" towards the newbies and making a sense of the mess, with some how-to thrown in.
If you don't have a blog, YouTube channel, an affiliate program, and lots of free content or search results where people can find you, then that's yet one more tool that your competitors have at their disposal, that you don't.
Useful content: weekly podcast, weekly video, weekly blog post.
Ideas: roundup your favorite links, post an embed reactor (a YouTube video and your opinion underneath it), become a "data scientist" and share your results
Think beyond just a blog: guest posts, podcast, book, viral videos
Mild keyword stuffing: use phrases people are searching
(Steve Celeste wasn't actually his real name, and his blog is long gone, but you can check out an archive on the Wayback Machine.)
Steve Celeste's blog and marketing training gave me the idea of creating a "build it to sell it" site. We used that model on DailySeminar.com. I didn't want to commit to a chore of having to crank out membership content on a regular basis, so we listed it for sale even as we were launching it. I also made sure things like the Clickbank account, membership software, etc. were all things that could be detached.
The site only had 53 members paying $47/month, but we had 55 "weeks" of content (20 minute Monday training, 20 minute Tuesday training, 20 minute Wednesday interview, Thursday bonus report, and Friday question day) created in advance. That part took about 40 hours of total "work" -- mostly recording training. We launched it on December 15th of (year removed but it was over 8 years ago). By February 27th of the following year, we had a buyer for $32,000 for everything. $32,000 from 40 hours? That's not a bad payday.
How do you decide what info to give away or charge for? The answer: Use the "William Shatner" model (he has 228 acting credits on IMDB, appeared as himself in 357 more appearances, 9 CDs on Amazon, and 70 books on Amazon). Keep putting stuff out there.
Reasons People Buy From You
They love you: they buy everything you put out (top 1%)
They want it (fad or trend): You got in front of a wave, i.e. everyone's talking about membership sites or one click funnels so you're teaching that
They need it: you're solving a real problem (people will always need to know about affiliate programs, copywriting, etc.)
Fear, convenience, entertainment
What path brings people to you? Our favorite Platinum studnet (Dr. Charles) came from a Jeff Mills guest webinar we presented, then he attended our live event in Salt Lake City and joined our Platinum there. Another Platinum client came from a one-time $997 mastermind session we both attended in Las Vegas. Yet another Platinum student of ours came from a speaking gig where I presented an pitched a $997 offer in San Diego.
Blogging and podcasting the "random-ness" (mindset etc) has put me on a path for the big ideas for books and courses. Here's where I stay in inspired and get a "feel" for what's popular and what people want to hear (without becoming a copycat or a me-too):
Facebook: Unfollow the negative nelly, political complainers or time vampires on Facebook and instead follow: BusinessInsider, Entrepreneur Magazine, Inc Magazine, Fast Company.
It's also been helpful seeing bloggers like Tim Ferriss from the Four Hour Workweek write long-form blog posts in an era where people are trying to tell you that attention spans are down. John Lee Dumas from Entrepreneur on Fire consistently publishes 5 podcast interviews per week (now well over 1100+) which I find super cool. IMNewsWatch is yet another example of sites that put out tons and tons of helpful free content that lead to things to buy.
Follow a formula with your writing, like this:
How to (3 things -- each crazier than the last), without (blank) -- add a keyword or two if you can
Questions, categories: create some kind of order or structure from the huge mess of possibilities
7 ways, 12 tweaks, 35 websites
You don't have to write "poetry" as you're not Seth Godin. Provide value and don't worry about rhyming, or being catchy.
Tip of the Week: I use Zapier to either propagate social media, or notify you every day to produce or publish that content. The most prolific writers have a schedule.
Five Steps to Profitable Content Marketing
Part 1: Consistent podcasting. Join us inside of PodcastCrusher.com to get your podcast up and running in 5 minutes, so you can double dip untapped search results and get listed in BOTH Google and iTunes.
Part 2: 5 minute YouTube videos all week to capture those searches. What do people actually search for? Check out 100 competing YouTube videos with high view counts and group them 4-5 categories. If you haven't experimented sending your subscribers to a video or blog post, you need to. It stirs up the list and gets people to login again.
Part 3: Blogging ideas. Here are some ideas if you're stuck:
A. Why did you get started? Early successes and failures B. What angers you? What's being done wrong in your industry and what are you reacting to? C. Or, just give me something helpful
Part 4: Book. Combine your your best stuff (greatest hits) into a Word document. MakeAProduct.com shows you how to use Kindle and CreateSpace to put out your hardcover and softcover books.
Part 5: Accidental sales. This is where you have so much free stuff out there, that it's hard to tell where your sales exactly came from... iTunes, YouTube, Kindle, your blog, or just a plain Google search. Put out something high ticket, or something with a payment plan and yearly support. This is great for software.
Now that you've used content marketing to feel your niche out... what does their business depend on? What tool or service could you put out there to 10X their business and make them depend on you, in a good way? Maybe you create template sites for offline businesses and charge $2400/mo to keep them going (like Lance and I do). Maybe you create a managed AdWords ad maintenance service, or a Facebook ad service.
The point is, many marketers have a scarcity mindset when it comes to being helpful and putting out content. They're "afraid" of sharing anything cool because they're worried that sharing something for free takes out of a paid product.
My answer to that is to use that free content marketing as a way of getting the bugs out, and build something software or service based into your products so it doesn't matter how much "free" information is out there. They still need your software (or tool) to make it happen.
One of the best ways to make money online is to create content that solves problems but a lot of us struggle with writer's block. The answer to that "blank page" is to have a system.
Don't be afraid that using a system or a template will result in something that is bland and not unique. It's quite the opposite. The best thing about using a system is that you get the thing DONE.
Three Elements of A System
The system component-you can think of it as your approach, the actual "1-2-3" of getting words on paper. For example, if you're creating a 400-word article, don't say 400! That sounds huge.
Instead, break it down into: Title, Intro, 3 points, Summary, and a Call to Action. Now, what if each of these sections was 50 words? Sounds a lot better, right? You can make things even easier by turning everything into a question.
This is a really easy way to do it. Act like you're having a conversation with someone about your subject and think what they would ask about your subject. The answers become your text.
Example: What are the 3 things I need to have when playing the guitar? Instead of your title being "Guitar Basics", it becomes, "How Do I Play the Guitar Quickly?"
Another Approach is "So What?"
This is really helpful in a sales letter. If you notice you have a weak headline and bullet points, pretend someone is saying to you "So what?"
You are forced to answer back with something compelling and exciting and emotional. Now, you have script that will hold your buyer's attention!
Keep in mind that with sales letters (and with books), you are going to lose someone every 10 minutes. So, for every 10 minutes of reading, you need to have something really exciting and compelling to keep them engaged.
Make your buyer say "I don't know", with your email headlines.
This is the most effective approach for email marketing.
We want to present a question that arouses curiosity.
Ex: Don't do a headline like "Simple Guitar Playing."
Instead, your headline should be "Are you missing out on these 3 simple guitar tricks?"
Then, your buyer is saying, "I don't know. Am I? Let me click over to this link and see".
Type out sentences that are only 7 words in length. It sounds silly, but it forces you to keep your language simple. Outside of academia, you don't want to use complicated language and long sentences. It turns internet readers off.
Think of keywords if you're really stuck. If you are still really stuck, think in terms of keywords. Have one keyword for each of your 3 bullet points.
For example, if you're writing about webinars, your keywords are: "title, date, and time."
Then, your first bullet point is on "I create a compelling title for my webinar", the 2nd bullet point is, "The date is more important than you might think because of your demographic" and the 3rd point would be, "Consider your customers' time zones carefully when you're scheduling."
Time Management: Give Yourself a Time Frame
You really need to do this. If you give yourself unlimited time, the odds are you will sit in front of that blank page for 5 hours with no results.
At one point, Robert spoke out 100 articles in one day. How?!!?
If you try to think of 100 subjects that your business covers, you're probably going to get overwhelmed and walk away. Instead, think of just TEN subjects and then break those down into 10 prompts (or questions) for those categories.
For example, if your business is guitar instruction, your categories might be: equipment, beginner, advanced, starting a band, album recording, etc. Then, for equipment, you'd have "acoustic vs. electric" as a prompt. For starting a band, a prompt would be "how to book shows."
With this approach, Robert just started answering and recording the questions/prompts, one after the other and each one took about 3-4 minutes.
For this, he used his Logitech Headset and Camtasia for recording. He gave himself 1-hour blocks for each category. If each prompt = 4 minutes, you can do 40 articles and have about a 20 minute break.
That timeframe sounds really tight but if you force yourself to cram a lot into a little space of time, you end up with something better than if you had all the time in the world to blather on.
The Motivation: this one is simple. For most people, that's the money. You need to put content out there if you're going to sell anything.
The "10-7-4" Mind Hack
It's easiest to think of 10 things that people need and want to know about anything. This mind hack gets you trained to brainstorm quickly and then easily find the best to offer your customers.
It's super easy. Think of 10 questions. Write them all down. Cross out the weakest 3. Now you have 7 points left. Here's how you use them! For an e-book: You now have 7 chapters. Pick the best 4, which are going to be aimed at your beginners and basic knowledge. Put those in the front. Leave the rest for the remaining 3 chapters.
For more info on how to jet-fuel your e-book writing and publishing, go to Robert's course at Make a Product.
For a Sales Letter: you have 7 modules now that you can offer in your product you're selling. Your best 4 are going to be what your program actually is and the remaining 3 modules can be your bonuses.
For more info on how to write a great sales letter FAST, check out Robert's course called Speed Copy.
For a Webinar: compress your 7 down to 4. Most webinars should only contain about 4 in an hour's time. Then, those 4 can actually mirror the 4 modules of your product. You can use the additional 3 points to interweave throughout your presentation but you're focusing on your best 4.
For a great course on how to start and run your own webinars in no time flat, check out Webinar Crusher.
Today's Take-Aways and Some Extra Advice
You need to be excited about the content that you're creating so that you will finish it.
Don't use $10 words. Write the way you actually talk. If you write an "English paper", you'll lose customers.
If you can dictate your articles, etc., that's even better. Usually, the way you FIRST said something is just about right.
It's more important to have it all down and edit later than have nothing. If you keep trying to edit while you're writing, you will never get anything done. It's important to create and put out a lot of stuff because you don't know which is going to pan out.
You want to get to the point where you are churning out content in one-take and you have a pool of content. You need to have a system, time management and motivation working together.
Get all the latest insights with membership sites, passive income, mindset, and more.
About Robert & The Podcast
The Marketer of the Day Podcast interviews entrepreneurs who have been through “the struggle.”
They’ve experienced the headaches of repeat failure, trial-and-error, scaling, delegating, course-correcting, and getting their online businesses to succeed beyond their wildest dreams… and want to help you get to where you need to go.
