I'm Outing Myself – The Positive Side

Posted on 6 December 2011 by Frank Haywood

I've had more than a little problem putting this together – I intended letting this out on Saturday and I've had to put it back.

I knew it might be a bit difficult, and it has been.  I ended up writing a lot more than I intended to, and now I've put all that to one side and started again as I'm sure you don't want to see something the size of War and Peace.  ;-)

I'll get right to the heart of it.

In late 2002 (around about this time of the year), I was diagnosed with severe depression bought on by job related stress.

I know some people reading this will think that depression is just another way of saying you're feeling a bit down.  And that's exactly how I used to think of it until it was my turn.  ;-)

We all say it don't we?  "I'm depressed…"

But feeling a bit down doesn't even get anywhere near what depression is really all about.  And no, you can't "shake yourself out of it" in much the same way that you can't shake yourself out of any other life threatening illness, like cancer for example.  I know that one might be a hard one to swallow for some, but it's true.

I sincerly hope depression never touches you.

Anyway.  I won't bore you with the details, but I ended up being off work for two years and then finally leaving the company I was working for.  I later found out that at the time long term illness (due mainly to depression) within my business group was running at an incredible SIX percent – I think the industry standard is something like a quarter of a percent for ALL reasons.

The company had gone bad, and taken me (and a lot of other people) down with it.  I was in a bad way, and it's left its mark on me.

So I left.  But I wasn't idle for the two years I was off work.  You might say I was lucky enough to be able to spend that time researching and learning how to run my own business – under doctor's orders I hasten to add.  Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) helps a LOT with depression.  For me it means "Keep yourself too busy to get any worse and hope you start to get better."

Following that period, there were some rough times but we still did okay, and eventually I moved away from selling physical goods and into my first love of software.

And here I am today.

The depression *has* changed me.  I can't say for good or bad, I'm just different.

I'm almost back to the fun loving and very sociable person I was over ten years ago, but it's taken a long time to get here, and there have been ups and downs.  (I still have my grumpy days, but I don't think I'm any different to most people in that respect.)

One of the changes now is I'm a VERY positive person, and I've also become a bit of a workaholic.  Although I still like to kick back and enjoy myself as a reward for my hard work.

The positive aspect of my nature is part of my defensive shield against future "issues" and it's a good thing to have, but means I can't and won't tolerate any negativity or negative vibes from people.  My attitude is a little bit of "If you want to bring yourself down, that's YOUR choice, now get out of my face."  ;-)

It means that although I'm a much kinder more empathatic person, I will no longer "Put up with fools gladly."  I now say if you want someone to blame for all your problems, go look in the mirror.

And that's exactly how I lead my own life now.

If I have a problem, it's my problem and I caused it.  Something I did, some choice I made means it happened.  And by accepting responsibility for everything in my life (the good things too) I don't dwell on why things work out the way they do.  I already know it's because of me and the effect I have on the world around me, even when it's a bit unexpected.

And conversely, I no longer even try to accept responsibility for what other people do, and who then try to lay it at my door.  (I teach this to my children.)

They did "this", then "this other thing" happened as a result, even if it was an accident or a freak occurrence – THEY made the initial decision, the responsibility is theirs.

"Don't try to blame anyone else except yourself" has become a lifestyle for me.  And it's both liberating and exhilarating.  :-)

So why the heck am I telling you all this for?

It's important.  But this is already long enough, and so I'll tell you in the next post.

Until then.

-Frank Haywood

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2012 Personal Coaching Programme

Posted on 1 December 2011 by Frank Haywood

After many requests for help I've received from people this year about how to set up their sites, how to create a product, how to outsource it, how to build a mailing list etc, I'm finally able to offer a coaching programme.

Unlike some marketers who only make their money by coaching others, I'm the real deal.  I'm like you.

On Wednesday 7th December I'll make an announcement as to how you can sign up for coaching with me.

This will be a little different to the usual "run-of-the-mill" progammes as you'll be getting direct access to me via Skype or phone. And I'll also expect you to be open to doing other projects with me under my guidance, as a joint venture partner.

It will be an ongoing 12 month programme, although you will have at least one product and web site at the end of the first 60 days coaching.  Depending on how fast you can work, there's no reason why you couldn't have at least two products and web sites (it's up to you), and you'll soon learn how you can create one per week with a bit of effort.

One per week?

Well, long time readers of this blog will know that's almost exactly what I've been doing over the last couple of years.  And I also know there are people reading this that have bought pretty much everything I've ever released.

You'll learn how you can move fast and achieve the same kind of results as I do.  There have been many times where I've had the idea on Monday and delivered the product on Friday.

The focus will be in the IM niche and will be on product creation, traffic, list building, outsourcing and earning lots of money.

Due to the very personal nature of the coaching, you will be one of only 10 people that I'll be working with. I don't believe I can offer you the kind of attention you need to succeed with any more than that.

I know that some people will want to know how much the personal coaching will cost, and my first (and experienced) response to that is if you're serious about succeeding online it shouldn't matter.  You're simply coming at it from the wrong point of view.

This is NOT an expense, it's an INVESTMENT.  In you.

There's never been anything more true than "you have to give to get", so just put it on your credit card and pay it back out of the profits.

Let me put this into perspective.  A few years ago I paid something like $10,000 for coaching, and although I didn't get everything that was advertised (shrugs) and a lot of it was unnecessary (shrugs again) I still consider that the BEST investment I ever made.

I paid for it on my credit card and maxed it out.  The credit card company being the evil swines they are then upped my limit, but that's another story.

All I want to say here is, I'm NOT going to be asking you for anything like the $10,000 I paid.

This is SERIOUSLY affordable if you're SERIOUS about making a go of it online.  I don't know, maybe you've had a bit of a skirmish already with creating a product, but it didn't go anywhere?

We can fix that.

On Saturday I'll tell you something very personal about me that I've shared with maybe two or three people over the last few years.

I'll publicly explain how and WHY I got into marketing, and what drove me to do what I now do, and why my options became limited and why I HAD to do what I do.

Who knows?  You may have a similar story.

Please leave a comment with your thoughts.

-Frank Haywood

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Five Minute Reviews – New WSO

Posted on 13 November 2011 by Frank Haywood

Some time on Monday 14th, I'll be releasing a new WSO and it's the first of a couple of projects I've been working on with Martin Salter.

If you've been reading my recent emails then you'll have already heard me mention Martin a few times.

He is AMAZING.

While people have often told me they're impressed with the amount of products I put out (yeah I know I don't always get it right), my output is piffling compared to what Martin can do. He can put together an entire product including videos, ebooks, sales page design and sales copy in 20 working hours (at a push).

I'm 99% certain that there are people reading this who have had Martin create a white label product for them. And I'm 100% certain that there are people reading this that have bought one of Martin's products and not realised it was Martin who created it.

;-)

So you know that when he gets stuck into a longer term project then it's going to turn out something special.

This is the first of them that we've collaborated on and we think it's pretty damn cool. We've both said that if we saw this when we were both starting out a few years ago we'd have snapped it up. But the nice thing is it's not just for newbies either. Even though we're the ones creating this, we'll be using it on our own sites too.

It's something we've both been doing for a few years now in an on-off fashion when it takes our fancy, so it's nothing new in that respect. But it's very new when it comes to how it affects you.

We've created an easy (for you) way of adding product reviews to your blogs in under 5 minutes per review.

The way it works is we create the reviews at an average 2-3 per month – very probably more than that – and you do a quick copy and paste of a shortcode with your affiliate links embedded inside and create a new WordPress post. This then creates a short pre-sell review on your web site which points to a fuller pre-sell on a completely unbranded white label site.

Pre-sells are a great way of introducing a potential buyer to a product.

All the white label site reviews appear with your name on them and your affiliate links – the method we've put in place effectively rebrands the site to appear as if it's all yours. When a visitor clicks the link on ANY of the reviews on the rebranded site, you earn the commission.

What that means is that even if people don't buy the product in the review they originally came to read and instead buy something else, you STILL earn the commission on that other product. (Martin and I don't take any of the commissions – they're all yours – we earn our money from membership subs.)

Now we know that there are some membership review sites out there already, and that they're asking for $27+ / month – eventually we'll be there too when we hit our targets.

But on the 14th we're releasing a WSO for $7 membership which is a $5 discount on the official launch price. This is a monthly recurring subscription, and we think it's so low and so easy to increase your income that it's the proverbial no-brainer.

When you've registered and added your affiliate IDs, then it will take you about 5 minutes to add each new review to your blog. Mix that in with some regular blog content of your own and you'll begin to build and fatten your personal cash cow.

Even if you consider yourself a complete newbie, then you can do this.

And once you have your reviews in place, then all you need to do is make forum and blog comments in order to see traffic clicking through to your blog. Where you could then also make them an offer to join your mailing list.

So not only do you easily build a pre-sell review blog, you also get to build a mailing list. :-)

I hope you can see the potential in this simple to do method.

I'll drop you a line on Monday the 14th when the WSO opens.

-Frank

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Outsourcing Your Business With OutVeo

Posted on 13 September 2011 by Frank Haywood

I had to tell you about this as soon as possible as this topic is very close to my heart, and very importantly on the 23rd September the price goes up from $17 to $97 so you need to get this sooner rather than later.

YES, it's very likely that you NEED this either today or any day soon.

YES, I AM a little bit excited about how it can help us both.

YES, I DO think this is a bargain.

One of the things that can make the greatest difference to your online business is to outsource some (and hopefully one day all) the work.

It's not easy though.  First you have to find someone to do these tasks, then you have to train them to do it your way, and finally you have to hope they don't disappear part way through a project.  It's happened to me several times.

The hardest part though is keeping your staff organised, and also keeping tabs on the state of each task and project.  It's easy enough to do with one and even two outsourcers, but then it starts to get steadily more difficult after that.

I've always thought wouldn't it be much better if it could all be held together in a more structured and organised way?

Yes, there are some solutions out there such as BaseCamp and ActiveCollab, but I've tried both and I wasn't overly impressed with either, and I know lots of people would disagree with me on this, but BaseCamp just plain *sucks*.

I don't mean that it sucks in every circumstance, it's just that the current crop of management tools are all aimed at bigger businesses.  Not one of them that I've found addresses the need of the entrepreneur like you and me.

If you've had the same experiences I've had, or even if you're not there yet, then sooner or later you'll probably realise that what's been needed for a long time is some organisational tool that addresses our particular needs when hiring outsourcers.

And in pursuit of that goal, I've been making notes the last 6 months trying to figure out the best way to even start approaching this.

Sadly (and also happily) I've been beaten to it and it's all now done and dusted.

Yesterday I was told about (and immediately bought) an outsource management script called OutVeo that you absolutely do NOT want to miss out on.  As soon as I saw it I knew it was something we ALL must have.

It's deeply discounted down to only $17 until the 23rd September and believe me on this one, if you miss this discount now you'll regret it later – it really is one of the "must-haves".

(It's actually $27, but you get a further $10 discount down to $17 if you promise to leave an honest review in the next couple of weeks.  I have no problem there.)

Now I realise that you may not have reached the point in your business where you're ready to use it right now, but if you keep moving forward then eventually you will be.  Right?

OutVeo pulls together the whole process of organising your outsourcers in terms of staff, tasks, deadlines and payment.

I admit I'm just a little bit jealous that Brian Terry has beaten me to it.

*sigh*

Oh well.  My loss, your gain.

Possibly the best thing about OutVeo is it's a self-hosted script that you install on your own domain.  So unlike pay-per-month-per-head services like BaseCamp, you pay once (currently discounted from $97 down to only $17) and own it forever.

Add as many staff as you like and it doesn't cost you a bean more.

Considering the development that must have gone into OutVeo, being able to get it for just $17 means it will be one of the best buys you've ever made.

http://www.frankhaywood.com/outveo/

-Frank Haywood

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PLR Membership Re-opening

Posted on 7 September 2011 by Frank Haywood

Update: The PLR membership is now OPEN and is currently $27.00/month until I reach my target number of subscribers. At that point I'll increase it to the regular price of $47.00

You can get to the sales page here:-

http://www.plahh.com/

***

Tomorrow (Thursday) I'll be re-opening my PLR membership at a temporary reduced price, and I'll reveal that price now.  It's just $27 a month for PLR to TWO product sets.

Or put another way, it works out as $13.50 each…  ;-)

But that price is only valid until I fill up my remaining slots to make the membership viable for me to continue to run.  (It's been touch and go.)

Each month you'll get PLR to 5 sales page designs, PLUS additional PLR to either a WordPress plugin or theme, or a PHP script or other program, or a special report or video set created by me.

It's a pretty good deal.

Just the five sales pages alone are worth your membership.

Ask anyone.  If you were to pay to have ONE sales page created for yourself, they'd cost you $47-$97 depending on who did them for you, and all you'd get back is the design with uneditable PNG or JPEG files.

With the ones we supply you get Private Label Rights to the entire pack of 5, PLUS all the PhotoShop PSD source files.  In addition we make sure there are no hard-coded text in graphics (wherever possible) and in the few cases there are, we also supply blank JPEGs or PNGs so you can use your favourite graphics editor to add your own text.

Okay?

As for the cost of developing the WordPress plugins and themes, you're talking anything from five hundred to two thousand dollars and upwards – go find out for yourself.  So I think it's fair to say that every month you're getting between $750 to $2000 worth of products you can rebrand and call your own.

At the special relaunch price of $27 it's not just a good deal it's a smoking deal!

***

First I'd like to give you a bit of background about the membership.  I opened it in November last year, and everything went fine until about March when my one and only designer took an office job in Singapore.  He still does some part time work for me.

Then I had to fire one of my plugin developers as he was supposedly working full time for me and (when he slipped up) we found out he was also working "full time" for one of my friends.  (No wonder he was getting slower and slower…)

This left me with a full time plugin developer and a part time designer.

And then to make matters worse, my remaining developer decided to go look for an office job too and also went part time in June.

While this was all going on I just couldn't find the right people to fill the gaps left behind and from April until now I've been struggling to fulfill the promise of 2 monthly PLR products as part of the membership.

It even got to the stage last month where I'd just about decided to close up shop on the membership as I couldn't see how I could continue to deliver products like I had been – I'm certainly not a designer or a plugin developer.

And then out of the blue I picked up two new designers, one of whom can create WordPress themes.  Hurrah!

I then (by accident) found a part timer who is now in training to become my full time PA and Project Manager in March 2012.

But the icing on the cake is I also found a new full time coder, AND just this week my part time developer has increased her weekly hours to almost full time.

Suddenly I have a full set of staff and that makes the membership viable again.  And I also have enough "give" in there to make sure that if someone leaves then the membership won't suffer like it has this year.

***

To kick off the relaunch of the membership with a bang tomorrow, I'm adding in some extras.  So instead of you joining and getting one month's worth of products, I'm including a few more bits and pieces too.

The current product set is for August, but I've left July's active too.  September's will be ready next week.

So when you join tomorrow, you not only get July and August's membership products, you'll also get September's too when I add it in a few days time.

That's THREE months worth of membership in this first month.  (For existing members I'll put something else in so you don't feel left out.)

Forget pretty good, forget smoking, this is a RED HOT deal.

But ONLY when you join tomorrow at just $27 / month.

When I fill the minimum membership slots I need, then the price goes back up.

I'll give you some additional details tomorrow and re-open the membership at 6.00pm GMT (1.00pm EST).

-Frank Haywood.

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© 2011 Frank Haywood