Frank Kern shows off his Porsche.I am at a conference called Mass Control, put on by the venerable Frank Kern. Frank is considered somewhat of a rock star in the Internet Marketing world. (If you’re not in Internet Marketing, when you think about your industry, just substitute some wiseass who has made tens of millions of dollars and thinks Ferraris are pieces of crap, and you get the idea.)

Frank, like many of the Internet marketing “gurus”, got his start in the old days of Internet marketing — which was actually something like 1998, or maybe 1999. Back when, as Frank and the other gurus will tell it, nobody thought it was possible to make more than $100,000 in a day. Now that record has been shattered, and Frank and many of the others who speak at these conferences have made $2 million, $3 million, or even $5 million in a single day from a product launch. Typically, they also all promote other gurus’ products to their huge mailing lists.

As you listen to Frank, or any of the other “gurus”, recount their stories, you can’t help but notice two things: All of the gurus seem to be male, and pretty much all of them are white. At Mass Control, for instance, there aren’t any female speakers, and probably 85% or 90% of the attendees are male.

Today, I was speaking to one of the attendees, and, in a moment of attempted bonding, he asked me the following question:

“Erica, don’t you think Internet marketing is just an old boys’ club?” (more…)

How do you envision your future retirement?

Some shocking statistics recently caught my eye. The median IRA balance is just $55,000, and the median 401(k) balance is just $15,000. Baby boomers are working longer, since most do not have enough saved to retire comfortably. And, given the statistics, it’s likely you are in the same boat.

Why is it that so few of us save enough for retirement? Why are we so woefully underprepared? (more…)

Let’s be realistic: Blogging can seem like a ton of work for very little return. The vast majority of bloggers make less than $500/month for many hours of work. Why, then, should you put in the effort to build a successful blog?

Here are four reasons why you should consider starting a blog: (more…)

Your customers are speaking
a different language than they were
a few months ago…We, as business owners and marketers, have failed to realize that the game has completely changed.

Our customers are speaking a different language than they were even 3 months ago. The sales tactics that worked a few months ago won’t work now without major tweaking. Furthermore, I don’t see any business that has really picked up on our customers’ new language. (more…)

Is emulating the “big boys” really a key to success?One of the most common mistakes I see when people first start a business — and I see this one clearly because I did it myself — is to want to make themselves look more “corporate.”

Sometimes, corporate is good — it’s professional. For instance, I don’t recommend using those tear-out business cards with dotted-line edges. Can we put those back in the 1980s where they came from? 😉

The mistake I most often see is not in business cards, though — it’s in the message of your business. There is a pervasive belief that the more “corporate” your website and emails look, the better.

I completely disagree, and here’s why. (more…)