Recently, in an email, I was told that a well-known motoring T.V. host had just discovered that the little arrow alongside the fuel pump symbol indicates which side of the vehicle the filler cap is.
I’ve known that for years, as it’s been like that for the 50 years I’ve been driving.
I haven’t checked lately, but it was always in the owner’s manual of the cars I owned or drove.
It’s a handy tip for those who need to hire cars.
RTFM was a common expression in the early days of the Internet when someone would ask a question that was answered in the manual.
Then there was a rather thick manual covering most situations in excruciating detail that most people didn’t read.
Now, of course, when you contact the ‘help desk’ of most big companies via email, they don’t read it.
Instead, they pick out one part and answer that, which doesn’t usually cover your main question.
Since there is rarely a manual to read, their response is less than helpful.
But Hanlon’s Razor comes to mind.
“Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.”
Then you realise that people operating the ‘help desks’ of the world are not conspiring against you.
They just don’t understand their software or tools any better than you do.
Of course the same can be said of our political class and their advisers.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. In January, I wrote about building a money-making blog
Some people will tell you that blogging is no longer a way to make money. Mainly because they don’t make money with their blog(s). Check out flippa.com and have a look at the blogs for sale there. Yes, there is a big range of prices and revenue, but this is…
You must write a bunch of posts to get the blog enough attention to attract traffic.
To help you see how easy this can be, I’m sharing an article I found that explains exactly how to build many posts without writing all of them yourself.
Doing this shouldn’t take you more than an hour a day to source and post to your site, and it will help your visitor retention, improving your ranking and bringing more visitors.
You have power over your mind — not outside events. Realize this, and you will find strength.‘
Marcus Aurelius.
You do have power over your mind.
The Secret is correct in that part, and it is also true that everything in our world that’s man-made has come from someone’s imagination.
But they didn’t ‘manifest it’ by thinking about it.
Belief in that is where The Secret becomes dangerous.
It’s a nice way to spend some time.
Daydreaming about how your life will be different when you win the lottery or have a business that makes $1 million a year, but it will remain a fantasy if you don’t take some action.
With the lottery, you do have to buy a ticket.
Not that that guarantees you’ll win, but it does mean you have a better chance.
With a million-dollar per year business, you’ll have to buy or build that.
To get to that million per year, you’ll first have to make that first dollar, then the first $100, then the first…
…you get the picture.
Baby steps on the right path grow to bigger steps leading to ten league boots.
Can you do that and become the hero at your place?
Of course you can, everyone can take baby steps.
Regards, Brent.
P.S.Start your first steps by setting up your landing page and autoresponder.
Some companies seem to think they’d be better off without their customers, so they treat them with ignore.
I really don’t understand the attitude.
Case one:
Last September, we had a wind storm here while we were away.
That storm damaged two different lots of outside blinds, so we put in an insurance claim and began the process of getting things fixed.
After six months, we finally managed to get the insurance company to give us the approval to get the repairs done.
The blinds came from two different companies, one small local one and one much larger national one.
Contact with the smaller company was easy, and they’ll complete the job when they said they would.
The national company have proved to be masters at failing to communicate, failing to get stuff in place so they can do the installation, and masters at the excuse.
I won’t be dealing with them again.
Case two:
An app that I need to use for my cycling records got updated.
It then promptly lost all my records and my connection to an online platform that had been working fine.
I couldn’t resolve the issue, a login problem, because there is no way on their website or in their app to recover a lost password.
I don’t think it’s lost.
I think they screwed it up with the update.
So I contacted them via their contact details on their website last week.
Not a peep from them.
My bike computer doesn’t work with any other application, so I’m totally screwed until they sort it out or I manage to figure out a workaround.
What is wrong with these people?
Have you got similar stories?
I bet you do. Let me know. I might feature the best ones in the email, anonymised and with your permission.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. Those free lead magnets have proved popular with you.
I trust you’re putting them to good use.
Would you like to have the whole funnel?
Because it’s in Convertri, I can provide a code that allows you to import the funnel to your account and drive traffic to it.
I’m not talking about the 9- 5, well, a little bit.
Until you have the income you want from your ‘not really working’ online business, your kids still need to eat, and your partner still wants some dry, warm place to sleep.
But I am talking about your online activities.
Some misguided gurus tell you that you have to grind all your spare hours to ‘make it’.
I say B.S.
When I’m riding my bicycle up a hill, I can try to ride up in a high gear, which means I have to put a lot of effort into the crank and grind up the hill, or I can select a lower gear and pedal faster, with less effort to climb.
I’ve noticed that often I go faster in the lower gear than I do when grinding.
Lance Armstrong also said you have to ‘spin it to win it‘.
All of which points to not working as hard to get the same or a better result.
Revising the subject line a little, I’ll say that working hard is for suckers.
You know that I prefer to say that you need to be persistent and consistent.
That’s what makes the difference.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. Grab one of these free lead magnets, set up a funnel and start finding places to get traffic.
I’ve shown you many ways to get traffic for free in previous emails, and there is a free traffic lead magnet on this page.
You must have targeted traffic to your squeeze and sales pages.
Which is true…
…sort of.
All your visitors have multiple interests.
The person interested in those great shoes is also likely interested in fashion clothing, losing weight, getting fit, finding or keeping a partner, keeping a pet, cooking or eating well, etc.
This means even random people hitting your website may be interested in what you have to offer.
When you think about it, the targeted visitors to your landing or sales page have self-selected by clicking on an ad or a link in a post.
Does this free you up for writing about things that interest you on your blog rather than attempting to tightly focus on a single niche?
I think it does.
I recently analysed a blog and calculated that they were averaging around $0.2 per visitor to their site, but they had roughly 20,000 visitors per day. You can do the maths yourself.
What was their source of visitors?
Pinterest.
I think they need more traffic sources, but that one is working for them.
Do they care about ranking high in the Google search results?
Not likely. Nor do they care about any algorithm changes that Google may make.
SEO? Pfhhh.
Is blogging dead? Doesn’t seem like it to me.
You could do exactly the same with a free blog.
All you need to do is write content and post images or short videos to your blog and Pinterest or whichever high traffic platform you choose.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. Want a free blog to test this out?
You’ll need around 100 posts to see real traction, but you should be getting some much faster than that.
According to one dictionary, susurrus means whispering or rustling.
It’s not a word that many people know and fewer use, but it accurately describes the Tinnitus that I have.
For those who don’t have Tinnitus, it’s a noise heard in one or both ears and can range from a loud squealing or ringing tone to a much softer rushing noise.
For some, it comes and goes, for others, it’s always there.
Mine is the rushing sound, a bit like the sound you get from a radio that’s not on any station or the sound of your computer fan.
It used to come and go, but now it’s a constant companion and has been with me for several years also causing some hearing loss.
Currently, there is no cure despite the claims of some marketers.
Why would I bother you with this?
Simply because I have been accepted into a pilot study at one of the local Universities to trial what may be a cure.
I’m hopeful and looking forward to the experience.
I would love to be able to use the word susurrus in a game of Scrabble rather than to describe what I’m hearing now.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. I made good progress on the project today even though I went for a ride this morning and the kids came for tea tonight.
Tomorrow I’m expecting to complete the tasks so that you may get access next week.
In the meantime, you’ll need somewhere to build your funnel and email list so you can take advantage of what’s coming.
There is so much going on that I’m feeling a little rushed.
I’m building a new funnel with some cool stuff in it for you.
You’ll understand why it’s taking longer than I wanted it to when you see it.
I tried to write a shopping cart for this funnel, but that proved extremely difficult, so I abandoned that approach.
The alternative has meant that I have to build over 80 pages in the funnel.
Don’t panic, you definitely will not have to visit every page.
In the meantime, I’ve had a website crash heavily and had to rebuild that, which took around 5 hours.
Then we’ve had the grandies with us for two days, tradespeople working around the house, a problem with my bicycle that needed sorting before tomorrow’s ride, an issue with the bike computer that I still haven’t resolved, plus a host of other minor things.
When you feel overwhelmed, it helps to remember that none of this is a life or death situation, it’s just life as it happens.
The secret is to deal with the urgent things, then the important things, and then whatever else you have time for.
Shuffle those priorities around to suit your circumstances, and it’ll always work out.
Regards, Brent.
P.S. This is the last time I’ll give you the link to the free short video training page.
I’m only doing it this time because I know that not everyone opens every email.
You should, of course, otherwise you’ll miss out on some really good links because I don’t always run them multiple times.
Anyway, this is the last time you get a direct link to this page.
