As a coach, I learn as much from my clients as they do from me. Today was no exception. I met with someone this afternoon who asked a great question. She had just purchased a marketing program and wasn’t sure if she had made a good decision. I hear this kind of question a lot.
There are tons of great offers that come your way every single day. Those sales pages are amazing. The testimonials blow you away. The value seems great. And you want to buy them all. And sometimes you do.
Then you get buyer’s remorse. Or you simply get overwhelmed with too much information.
So what is the solution?
I have three suggestions for you.
1. Look at the major challenges you are facing with your business right 
NOW. What are the main things that are holding you back from reaching your goals?
For many of my clients, it is that they feel like they lack focus. They don’t know who they’re trying to attract to their business and what they have to offer. In other words, they haven’t found their niche. And that’s why they’ve decided to work with me, because they know I can help them with that and they understand that their niche is most important foundation for their business.
If you’ve already found your niche and have a clear niche marketing strategy, then look at what is holding you back from achieving your next steps. Do you know how to create a website and landing page? If not, what is stopping you? Is it the technical part or the marketing copy or the keywords (or all of the above)?
You get the idea.
The bottom line is you have to identify your main challenges and then invest in the programs that will help you develop the knowledge and skills you need to move your business forward.
2. Take things one step at a time. You might need help with more than one thing, but you can’t learn it all at once or your head will
explode! Just take it one step at a time. Pick a program that meets your current needs and give it your all.
There is no magic bullet. No matter what you invest in, whether it is coaching or training or anything else, you are going to have to put in the blood, sweat and tears to make it work for you.
3. Rather than get sucked in by all those great sales pages, learn from them. Whenever you see a great sales page (or email), save it in a swipe file. Then when it comes time for you to create your own marketing copy, you’ll have some ideas to help you get started.
I hope you found this helpful. If you did, please share it with others by clicking on the Facebook and/or Twitter icons above. And be sure to leave your comments and questions below. Thank you!
Hi Cindy,
Great advice, thank you. And I do agree that there is so much good stuff that is available it can be a job in itself deciding what to take up and what to discard. I like the idea of creating a swipe file. I think that as time goes on, I find myself becoming more discriminating and yes, applying your ‘rules’ certainly simplifies matters.
Warm regards,
Helen
Hi Helen – You’re so right! All those emails can be very distracting. I like that you’re applying a filter to help you manage the process. Here’s my rule of thumb (which I try to live by). I set aside some time each day (often more than once a day, I’ll admit) to go through all my emails. When I open an email, I either reply, delete or move to a folder.
Great advice Cindy. It is so easy to get overwhelmed and yes, everything sounds like just the thing to get you on the right track. Problem is that you get sucked into purchasing all these products, then get overwhelmed and end up losing track of half of them and doing nothing. If I sound like I know what I’m talking about – yup, I’m a victim. Free stuff isn’t really free because you are then pitched and if you find yourself falling for everything, don’t get the freebies. Once you do you are usually bombarded with emails soliciting the best product not only from the marketer you got the freebie from, but they will also market affiliate products too. Over solicitation and I get wise and delete my name from their list and try not to get anything from them again because I know I’ll be bombarded once again.
Phyllis – you raise a great point. To build your list, you have to offer information that is valuable for your target market. I has to be something that addresses one of your target market’s top-burning needs. Once they’re on your list, you can market to them (whether it be your own product or someone else’s). But you don’t want to abuse that privilege or people will opt out. You have to continue to add value for your target market, strengthening the relationship and building a community of trust and collaboration.
Bonjour Cindy How true! My experience is that once I have selected a particular program or technique, someone comes up and tells me that I made the wrong choice and I should switch to their program as IT is the latest answer to all of my concerns. Now, I have decided to ignore (at least for the moment) those tempting offers and continue with the program until I have mastered its methods. Later, well, who knows? You do give sound advice and I appreciate it. Thanks Martin
Thar is so true. you can become overwhelmed by overwhelm. Your tips are so true. I call this the shiny button syndrome.
So true Morris – I like that “the shiny button syndrome”.
Martin – that’s great advice. Commit to what you’re doing before jumping ship and moving on to the next “shiny button”. The caveat being that if the program you’ve invested in isn’t what you need for your business right now, then you need to take a step back and figure out what you do need.
Here’s an example. I spoke with someone today who invested thousands of dollars in having a website created for her. But after reading my ebook, she realized that she wasn’t ready to have her website done for her, because she hadn’t yet found her niche. She didn’t know who she was marketing to, what solutions she could provide, and how she wanted to brand herself. She isn’t alone. It happens all the time.
I like this because it is so true. There are so many people trying to get you to learn from them and then it turned out to be a bad thing since they chose the wrong one.
Thanks for sharing.
Karen
Hello, Cindy.
With the plenthora of training programs that are out there floating around it certainly isn’t easy making the right choice.
I was once this way getting caught up in the hype of the “next best thing” and I was getting caught up in the overwhelming amount of information that all the experts were saying you need to know.
But we all must realize there is going to be a lot of great products and software in which we can all use and implement into our business – but it only helps if we are ready for that next greatest thing.
“Taking one thing at a time” is one of the best pieces of advice I’ve heard and it it’s one that should be repeated to oneself from time to time.
Great points Mark and Karen. The good thing is that a lot of those trainers say similar things. So its more a matter of finding a style and approach that works for you.
I see a lot of interesting articles here. I have bookmarked for future referrence.
Interesting article i totally agree with the comments above. Keep us posting
Hi Cindy,
Thanks for the valuable advice you share in your article. I thought it was just me, and now I can see that there is a lot of us out there who get caught up in the sales capture pages of the “Next best System”. Your three suggestions are exactly what I’m planning to do right away without delay!
That’s wonderful Ray. You’re right – you are not alone. Having strategic focus with your business, and understanding where you need help to move forward are great assets. thanks for your feedback!
This post is one of those tried and true isms. You can say it again and again and it never gets old.
You give good advice.
Sometimes we get caught up in trying so hard to make our businesses work that we get lost in the forest of marketing and hype.
Here is a Cindy quote “only invest in the programs that will help you overcome where you’re currently stuck”.
I’m going to post a sticky note with that quote on my computer to remind myself every time I’m tempted to buy that next shiny thing.
Thanks Cindy
That’s awesome Pam! I know we’ve talked about this and I totally understand the desire to get the latest and greatest. What I’ve discovered is that the latest and greatest is actually within you. There are no tricks or super pills. You have everything you need to succeed. Its just a matter of getting the support, training and guidance to foster that so you can share it with others who can benefit.