June 28, 2007

Another great email today. Pat fears the unknown!

Hey all,

I’m still getting all kinds of great emails with people telling me their stories
and troubles and all sorts of things. Some of them are so great to read like
this one from Pat P. I haven’t actually asked Pat if I could post her email
so I’ve left her last name as just an initial. But you’ll still get the point from
reading the email and my reply to her.

I’ve bolded some key concepts that Pat touches on. Here’s our emails to
each other.

Ian,

Guess I can fall into the same category as the letter from Betty.

Getting overloaded with information that seems easy to follow but then I get to a step and just procrastinate until I talk myself out of it. While the concepts are easy to understand the mechanisms of setting up auto responders, tracking, web hosting etc should seem to be easy, especially for someone like me who is self taught on many software programs; I am not afraid to try buttons and icons to see what they can do. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose everything and start over again. I usually don’t give up. Maybe frustrated a time or two, but I don’t give up.

Why, then does completing an internet business stop me cold when I hit that bump in the road? Is it because I can’t get the answers as readily as looking for the information? Is it because I don’t know where or who to turn too that won’t try to sell me the latest and greatest version of their product? How do you know what is a good niche market if you have no product? How do you market and build up your relationship with your list when you have no product but yourself?

I am very successful in what I do at work in the business world and got there by mostly OTJ (on the job) just plowing through to the end. And when I reach a point that someone wants something that I don’t believe I can do I procrastinate. But in the end, I end up doing it and find that the end result was not as bad as the fear I had doing it in the first place.

Fear is the factor that keeps me from pushing into an unknown marketplace. It stops me dead in the water for awhile, then I think I can do this and try again. This has been me for the past 3 years. I know the opportunities that I have missed by my procrastination and fear of moving out. It does become the motivator to seek out and find that opportunity that is just waiting for me.

Pat

PS I don’t live in Houston but visit from time to time. Maybe it would work with what you are trying to set up.

I personally thought this was such a great email mostly because Pat already has all the answers to her own questions! She’s in a predicament that’s so common to so many people. There’s a great chance you read that email and said to yourself that you feel the ‘exact’ same way! Here is my advice to Pat.

Hey Pat

What a great email

To me it really sound like the problem is that you just don’t know who to turn to for advice you can trust. And then because of that, you make a few mistakes, get scared to try again and you never really go anywhere.But you also realize that once you dive into your fear that it’s never as bad as it seemed and on the other side, you have some new information. You already realize your own problem and you already have your own answer…and it’s a good answer! Just DO IT. The more times you do, the better you’ll get at it. You know that’s true already.

As far as the complexities of learning Internet Marketing…

I like to think of it like this. If you needed information about buying a new car, and you walked into a room with 1000 sales men all talking at the same time about why their car is the best and how it’s going to make your drive so much better… you’d be OVERLOADED with info and you’d never really learn or hear anything. The internet is the same way. There’s a billion new products that all promise to teach you the next million dollar trick and people are GREAT at making promises that are so believable. They actually teach people how to write so compellingly. But I think the answer is to slow way down.

There’s a lot to learn in the Internet Marketing world. Pick 1 or 2 people that you REALLY believe have the answers that you are looking for. Then listen to everything they have to say. Don’t be afraid to try what they teach and fail. Failure is a process of learning. We all learn by making mistakes, not the other way around. You’re good…you’re on your way. No worries!

Thanks, Ian Herculson
http://www.IanHerculson.com