mark joyner - mind control marketing

M i n d C o n t r o l M a r k e t i n g . C O M

Copyright © 2008 Mark Joyner Inc. All rights Reserved

Please note that this is a limited edition ebook version of the rare out-of-print MindControlMarketing.com. If you did not get this copy from Simpleology.com,

you have an illegal copy of this manuscript.

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“Mark, why did you let MindControlMarketing.com go out of print? I can't undererstand why someone with a best-selling book would want to stop selling it.”

I’ve been asked that many times, and I guess the short answer is that “money isn’t everything.”

It’s a trite cliché, but one that fits.

Yes, I could have continued to sell the book, but I didn’t believe at the time that it was the right thing to do.

At the time I thought that teaching people about the loop-holes in the human mind that allow people to be manipulated was, while not inherently wrong (it can most certainly be used for both good or evil), not the best place to begin teaching people about marketing.

A more wholesome starting point is outlined in the next book I wrote: The Irresist-ible Offer.

In it, I teach people something new in the lexicon of business, but blindingly obvi-ous – that is that the “Core Imperative of Business” is to make an offer.

That all business is merely a quid pro quo – a this for that – an exchange of value between parties.

To really do business well – don’t dress up your offer – just make one that is so obvi-ously beneficial to your prospect that he’d be crazy to pass it up.

An obvious truth, but one that is not taught in business school.

Instead, we focus too much on the art and artifice of marketing.

We focus too much on smoke and mirror to make our offers seem like they are more than they really are.

And that is what is wrong with Mind Control Marketing as a concept. The ideas are

2008 Foreword from Mark Joyner F

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extremely powerful, but if you use them as your starting point, you’re starting a broken business.

In The Irresistible Offer I talked about “offer intensifiers” and that is the rightful place to which MCM should be relegated.

Now you know better, and I hope you use this potentially dangerous information in that proper context.

The Irresistible Offer is freely available at most bookstores and I highly recommend you pick up a copy and keep it on your bookshelf next to your print out of MCM. If you don’t want to purchase the print book, we've included an ebook version at no charge, located in the Bonus tab attached to this product.

Another way to use this information is to make yourself less influence-able. That is, these tricks and tactics are in use all day every day – whether we are conscious of them or not. And those who are using them do not always have our best interests in mind.

If we can spot these processes being used against us, it frees us up to make better, healthier decisions.

And that is a gift that will be worth much more to you after you use this information to make a pile full of money and then realize, as I did, that money isn’t everything.

Mark JoynerAuckland, New ZealandApril 2008

MindControlMarketing.com

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S T E E L ICARUS

M i n d C o n t r o l M a r k e t i n g . C O M

How Everyday People are Using Forbidden Mind Control Psychology and Ruthless Military Tactics to Make Millions Online

M a r k J o y n e r

I l l u s t r a t e d b y M a x K u o

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Editors: Virginia Duan and Olivia Neri Illustrations: Max KuoCover and Interior Design: Sunny Joo-Chen

© 2002 by Mark Joyner

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means without written permission from the publisher and Mark Joyner.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Joyner, Mark. MindControlMarketing.com

ISBN 0-9719-3250-6

Printed in the United States of America

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To my staff at aesop.com and to my angel (you know who you are…)

M.J.

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A c k n o w l e d g e m e n t sFirst, I would like to thank a few authors who have inspired me and whom I am

pleased to know personally. Too many to list here, but most notably: Jay Conrad Levinson ("Where is my box of Jujubes?!"), Joe Vitale, Joe Sugarman, Ted Nicholas, and Robert Anton Wilson.

The soldiers who taught me the most (your ranks have probably changed by now - and we've almost all grown out of touch, sadly): SSG Jimmy Brown - one of my teach-ers at OCS - your words kept me alive during some of the darkest hours of my mili-tary career. LTC David Reaney - my Battalion Commander while at the 751st Military Intelligence Battalion in the R.O.K. - just watching you was a constant lesson in enlight-ened leadership. Sergeant Major Wun Jo Kim of the R.O.K. Army - who I met first on the DMZ - you are a wise and fearless soldier. SSG (first name?) Tucker - E-2-10 Basic Combat Training in Fort Leonard Wood Missouri, 1990 - you probably don't remember me, but you were an amazing inspiration. SFC Andy Medler - my "Smoke" while I served my first "green cycle" as a Platoon Leader in the Artillery - a god-damned pain in the ass that saved my life and made me look better than I deserved. Command Sergeant Major Randy Woods - First Sergeant while I served in Alpha Battery 1-17th Artillery Battalion - you are the fiercest of warriors and if you don't make Sergeant Major of the Army one day it will be a damn crime. I still remember to this day when you and I finally came to terms - your terms - and I was a far better Officer from that day forward. To the fellow graduates of Officer Candidate School class 3-95. Few of you needed O.C.S. as badly as I did - thank you. To the soldiers of the 751st Military Intelligence Battalion. To the soldiers of the 1-17th Field Artillery Battalion. Copperheads! To all of the soldiers men-tioned here - I wonder if you all realize what an impact you had on me? If you're still in - I hope you read these words and can enjoy in the moment the impact you are having on so many lives. And thanks to all who have ever "served."

All of my "online marketing buddies": you are just too damn numerous to even begin! You know who you are. You are soldiers in the Army that is taking over the world of business - shhh!

My illustrator Max: you took my scribbles and turned them into accurate snap-shots of my brain. Not many could have pulled that off.

All my friends and family - most notably (the ones who believed in me the most): Brande, Jim, Brook, Sarah, Sam, Belinda, Carolyn, Vernon, Lisa, John, Erica, Kylie, the Tower Crew: (Beth, Will, Joe, etc…), Stewie, De-mo, Jimmy N., The Eric-Trish Clan, The Jay-Jeanie-Patsie Clan, Branden W., the old "Skeno" crew: (Vicci, Jeanie C., Andy K., Bessie, Joan, Forrest, Kevin, Steve, A.J., Andrea, Kelly, Bruce, Chris, Jim B. Jr. & Sr., and the list goes…) all surf-brothers past and present, Mom, and Dad.

My angel S.H. (you… where do I begin?)

Finally, to all of the employees of Aesop.com: thanks for believing.

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W h a t P e o p l e a r e S a y i n g a b o u t M i n d C o n t r o l M a r k e t i n g . c o m“Mark Joyner has created extraordinary success for himself and hundreds of others online. You'll be wise to read how he did it. I did, and it has made me a wiser business-man. Just one idea in this book could make (or save) you millions.”-- Robert Allen, author of “Multiple Streams of Income”

“Mark Joyner blends his remarkable success on the internet with his knowledge of military tactics to create a book on how to succeed on the web that is unlike any other book you'll find anywhere. His wonderful storytelling ability and Mark's uncanny approach to business is replete with real world examples and poignant lessons that are priceless to anyone wanting to market a product or service on the net. He'll clear up many misconceptions and set you straight on what works and what doesn't work and how to determine the difference.”-- Joseph Sugarman, Chairman of BluBlocker Corporation

“Mark Joyner is the reincarnation of Sun Tzu, adeptly applying those 6th Century Art of War strategies to a 21st century battlefield…the Internet. This man who sells millions of dollars of products online annually and develops sites that get millions of visitors monthly is a tactical genius. He has a unique ability to understand how people buy, and an even more unique ability to get them to buy.”-- Raleigh Pinskey, consultant, author and speaker on “The Power of Choice” www.raleighpinskey.com

“A wise man once said: ‘90% of this game is half mental.’ In the game of marketing, MindControlMarketing.com will give you a winning mental edge.

“Mark Joyner candidly shares dozens of hard-won lessons from his years as a US Army officer and Internet entrepreneur. Combined with his mastery of human psychology -- specifically, this guy knows exactly why people buy -- the result is ‘Special Forces’ mar-keting at its finest.

“Nobody else is teaching this stuff. Mark's insights into cognitive dissonance, framing, boldness, and military strategy (2,000 years worth!) will help you outflank, outmarket and outperform your competition.”-- Kevin Donlin, Author, Consultant, Guaranteed Marketing LLC

“Mark's book is not only wonderfully informative, not only exquisitely motivating . . . this well thought out, yet simple combination of art & science is inspiring to the deep-

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est levels of the reader's neuroogy, resulting in ACTION, where it counts most!”-- John J. La Valle, co-author of “Persuasion Engineering ™”

“Don't read this book. Devour it.

“MindControlMarketing.com is the most compelling and useful book on Internet Marketing I've ever read. Mark Joyner doesn't hold anything back. He enlightens the reader with gripping examples and riveting metaphors that make this page-burner an instant classic. His ideas will turn your website into a powerful money machine.

“I only meant to read the introduction, but I couldn't put the book down. After two hours of non-stop amazement, I immediately went to my websites and made changes. My marketing will never be the same. Nor will my income. Thank you, Mark.

“I feel guilty that I paid so little and got so much. This is the single most mesmerizing and effective book on Internet Marketing I've ever read. I'm glad I got it before my competitors did.

“Read this book before your competitors do.

“An absolute must for anyone who thinks they know something about Internet Marketing. Mark Joyner is the expert that experts turn to when they want to improve their marketing online."-- Tom Wood, CEO, TheDuplicator.com and HelpHenry.com

“MindControlMarketing.com will, without doubt, be hailed by marketing people as the definitive work on the psychological principles and military tactics to be employed in successful marketing campaigns. But ... it goes far beyond that.

“It has long been known that, in order to succeed in any business, a person must obey the admonition, ‘Know thyself.’

“Any person reading MindControlMarketing.com will gain a self-knowledge they will not find in any of the other strictly ‘marketing’ books. As a matter of fact, after reading your explanation of ‘The Zeigarnik Effect,’ your readers will know for a fact why nothing a business person ever does can be finished ... and why it should always be left unfin-ished.

“That little secret, alone, is well worth 10-times the cost of the book - but - there are countless lessons in the book for those who want to know themselves. Remember: The same psychological principles and military tactics your readers will be learning to use in their marketing campaigns are being used by those marketers from whom they

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What People are Saying about MindControlMarketing.com

are buying.

“By realizing what motivates them, your readers can better understand how to motivate others.

“Though most of your readers will buy and read MindControlMarketing.com to learn to improve their marketing efforts, those who study the psychological principles and mili-tary tactics you have explained will begin to understand the mental workings necessary to becoming a real entrepreneur.

“After reading MindControlMarketing.com, the studious reader will see why their own thinking has kept them just one-step away from the achievements they desire.”-- J.F. Straw, http://www.BusinessLyceum.com

“How good is Mark Joyner's new book? Last night, I went to bed and started reading it at midnight. I was still reading at 3:00 AM. Then I got up, made coffee, and began to revise my web marketing strategy. All too soon it was morning.

“Mark Joyner's new book avoids the tedious details and been-there/done-that feeling one gets from most web books. Instead, he breaks new ground by encouraging you to think out-of-the-box and base your web marketing strategy on lessons learned psycho-logical research and military warfare.

“Only an ex-military intelligence agent and battlefield warrior could write a book that integrates psychology, military history and web marketing.”-- Roger C. Parker, author, “Recession-Proofing Your Web Site,” www.recessionsiteaddress.com

“Mark Joyner helped create cyberspace marketing. He has not only redefined Internet marketing, he has turned it into a sophisticated, yet easy-to-use, moneymaking art form. With MindControlMarketing.com, the heavyweight champ in viral marketing offers you not only his unique perspective, but his tips, secrets and insights. Want to be a success on the Net - read this book!"-- Anthony Mora, President & CEO of Anthony Mora Communications, Inc. and author of "The Alchemy of Success" and "Spin to Win."

“As an Internet Marketer and CEO, I've seen a ton of people trying to make a buck, regurgitating other people’s ideas and making false business building claims - but not in this book. Mark Joyner takes psychology and warfare, combines them with his real life experiences and delivers a “must-read resource” for anyone doing or even thinking about doing business online.

“If I had this book when I started my online business, I would easily have another

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$1,000,000 in my pocket today!

“An innovative masterpiece for getting the competitive edge online. These tactics may be designed for your online business, but they apply to practically all areas of business. So if you are in management, sales, web development, an entrepreneurial startup, or a Fortune 500 CEO - Read and use these strategies - I guarantee you'll love and profit from them!

“This book should be priced at $100,000 or more because if you can't easily benefit from the tactics Mark Joyner reveals here, then you don't deserve to be online in the first place!”-- Ford Saeks, President & CEO, Prime Concepts Group, Inc.

“Mark Joyner takes online marketing up to a whole new level with this superb book. He blends solid online marketing experience with little known psychological insights. The book is as enlightening as it is fun to read. If you ever dreamt of making a fortune online, this book is mandatory reading."-- Jay Conrad Levinson, author, "Guerrilla Marketing" series of books

“This quirky book, which compares Internet marketing to warfare and contains bizarre cartoons, presents lessons on how to succeed in online marketing from an entrepreneur who has made millions of dollars doing so. For that alone, the book is worth many times its cover price. But the author also restates and makes crystal clear some of the proven principles and tested techniques of persuasion that work in all media. This shows he has familiarized himself with the marketing masters (indeed, many are personal acquain-tances of his) but in fact surpassed them when it comes to applying their methods to the Internet.”-- Bob Bly, Copywriter/Consultant, www.surefirecustomerservicetechniques.com

“This astonishing book reveals how people REALLY think--so you can capture, direct and lead them into buying your product or service. Stories and drawings bring these previ-ously secret principles to life, making this a joy to read, to boot. I actually took just one clever idea--from a cartoon, no less--and dramatically improved a sales letter I wrote. Riveting. Mind-expanding. A masterpiece.” -- Joe Vitale, author of "Hypnotic Marketing" and numerous other books and tapes, www.mrfire.com

“An extraordinary array of proven business building secrets guaranteed to skyrocket your internet profits upward then skyward! This book is destined to become the classic for leapfrogging your online competition!”-- Mike Litman, Co-author #1 International Best-Seller "Conversations with Millionaires,"

“Most people who do brilliantly at something are unable to share the core strate-gies that enabled their success. Mark Joyner proves he's not most people because in MindControlMarketing.com he reveals the insights and tactics that have guided him - also

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What People are Saying about MindControlMarketing.com

unlike most people - to build a super-successful dotcom.”-- Paul and Sarah Edwards, authors, "Getting Business to Come to You"

“Buy and study this book. Reveals the psychological keys you need to earn a fortune online.

“Full of jealously guarded marketing secrets by one of the world's most successful online entrepreneurs. Discover how to earn millions with zero marketing cost or risk. Mark Joyner's amazing online success story comes to life. Mark holds nothing back in this how-to-succeed-on-the-Internet classic. This book is destined to become the online Marketing Bible."-- Ted Nicholas, author of “Magic Words that Bring You Riches”

“Online marketing is the most cost effective way of doing business. Mark Joyner writes in an easy-to-understand way, that makes implementation seem possible.” -- Patricia Fripp, CSP, CPAE, Past President National Speakers Assn.

“Mark Joyner is the real deal -- he knows what it takes to succeed on the Web. That's because he's done, over and over, what so many others have only talked about. If you're ready to learn how to make vast sums of money marketing online, get this book and read every word!”-- David Garfinkel, co-author, www.ebooksecretsexposed.com

“The best book of the new millennium!”-- Robert Anton Wilson, co-author of “Illumanitus!”

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C o n t e n t s

I n t r o d u c t i o n

P r e f a c e

P a r t O n e : P s y c h o l o g y

1 Conformity to Group Norms The Herd Mentality and How to Use It 2 Obedience to Authority Yes Sir, No Sir, Would You Like My Credit Card Number, Sir? 3 The Foot in the Door Phenomenon Fending Off Your Mouse Click to Oblivion

4 The Zeigarnik Effect The Power of Unfinished Thoughts 5 Cognitive Dissonance Happiness Means Never Having to Say You're Wrong

6 Conformity to Emotions You Smile, I Smile; You Weep, I Weep

7 Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Tapping Into the Pursuit of Satisfaction

8 Framing Beauty May Be Only Skin Deep, But Who Wants to Be Ugly?

9 Uncertainty It's a Sure Thing That There's No Such Thing as a Sure Thing

P a r t T w o : W a r f a r e 1 0 Killer Junior Impending Death is One Hell of a Mother of Invention

1 1 Heavy Ground Waging the Economic Art of War

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1 2 Deception Avoiding the Deadly Delete Key

1 3 Concentration Kick Your Opponent Where It Hurts - Right in His Dispersion 1 4 Factors of Recognition Seeing is Believing ... And More

1 5 Continuous Operation How to Keep the Machine Running

1 6 Quick Victories Pick Battles Worth Fighting

1 7 Boldness and Taking Risks The Meek Shall Inherit Nothing

1 8 “Don’t Never Take a Chance You Don’t Have To” (from the Ranger Handbook) “Bold” and “Stupid” are Not Synonyms

1 9 “Don’t Ever March Home the Same Way. Take a Different Route So We Won’t Be Ambushed.” (From the Ranger Handbook) If You Don't Float Like a Butterfly, You're Going to Get Stung by Some Smart Bees

2 0 The Fox and the Rabbit Desire is Everything

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Introduction

What could I do?

When Mark let me have a sneak peek at this book when it was still in outline form, I gasped in disbelief. I then wrote him the following e-mail:

"Why, Mark? WHY? Why are you releasing this information to the public? I mean, I know you want to help people, but why release THIS information?"

He ignored me. He went on to write the first draft of his book. After I saw it, I sent Mark this e-mail:

"Mark, again, I strongly recommend that you do do not release this information to the public. Isn’t this information worth more to you if you keep it yourself? This book reveals how people REALLY think--so anyone can capture, direct and lead others into buying any product or service. Most importantly, do you really want just anyone having this kind of power? I’m not sure just anyone can be trusted not to abuse these ideas. Keep this to yourself!"

Mark disagreed. He said people could protect themselves when they know these psychological tactics. He also said that others could use these principles to ethically make money by persuading others. He went on and completed his book. You're now holding it in your hands.

Why was I so concerned about him releasing this material? Is it really all that powerful?

Look: Imagine if the deity who programmed human behavior showed you the operating manual he had worked from. You would then know the black-holes and blind-spots in people's minds so you could easily capture their attention and direct their behavior.

Wouldn't you hold some truly phenomenal power in your hands?

Wouldn't you have to be careful about who you influenced?

Wouldn't you be able to make more sales, lead more minds, and even com-mand segments of the public to submit to mass obedience?

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Mark's book is that very spell book. It reveals the way our minds operate so you---or anyone who knows this once forbidden information---can control the behavior of oth-ers.

I kid you not. Mark has taken his top secret experience in Army Intelligence, his years learning Asian military and martial arts secrets, and his legendary track record for making millions of dollars on the Internet, and weaved it all into a deceptively easy to read little nuclear device: This book.

I have never seen a book like this before. Ever. Yes, there are many books on persua-sion in print. But none have been written by a genius. None have been tested in the marketplace. None have explored the "command buttons" in the human psyche as this one does.

I actually took just one clever idea from this book--from a cartoon, no less--and dra-matically improved a sales letter I wrote. That may not sound very impressive until you realize I'm considered the hot shot of letter writers. I'm called “the world's first Hypnotic Writer.” My first e-book, "Hypnotic Writing," (published by Mark's company), continues to be an immortal best-seller. Yet one little cartoon from Mark's book, illustrating one very powerful psychological insight, helped me dynamite all of my previous sales let-ters!

I've seen Mark use the principles in this astonishing book to make unknown people famous (like me), sell hundreds of thousands of e-products (such as my own e-books), and persuade people to join his ranks (his mailing list is now well over one million names - how far over one million he won’t reveal, of course).

How did he do it? How can you do it? It's all explained in the following pages.

This book is riveting. Mind-expanding. Fun. Chilling. Challenging. An unquestion-able masterpiece.

I urge you to read it quietly, use it secretly, and keep it locked away from your com-petitors.

-- Joe Vitale, author of "Hypnotic Marketing" and numerous other best-selling books and audiotapes

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Preface

With a title like MindControlMarketing.com - the ethical integrity of this book may immediately come into question. Let us address it straight away.

The purpose is to teach people how to improve the influential power of their mar-keting - specifically through marketing on the Internet. However, anyone who wishes to improve the effectiveness of any marketing endeavor, their ability to persuade, their leadership skills, or even their ability to get along better with their fellow man can ben-efit greatly from these ideas. All of these things can be improved by having a certain amount of control over the minds of others. Although this form of persuasion is some-times extremely subtle, we all practice it every single day of our lives whether we like it or not. Sometimes we do so unconsciously.

Sometimes it is simply to get our friends to go along with our plans, or to get our children to obey, or for our children to persuade us! Yet, we are still practicing mind control every day.

Why not, then, learn to master this art?

Somehow, it is socially acceptable to persuade others subtly if done with a smile on your face. But the minute your intentions become clear, your integrity is immediately in question. I say this is a silly social convention that insults your intelligence.

Why not accept your nature and excel at this thing you do?

And then we might ask, is influence per se really unethical? When Gandhi influ-enced his people to partake in acts of passive protest, was this unethical? When the forefathers of the United States influenced people to rise up against the tyranny of 18th century Great Britain was this unethical?

When looking at it this way, it becomes clear that it is not the act of persuasion or mind control in itself that is unethical, but its application. Is mind control then only ethical when applied with good intentions?

Well, the Nazis believed their intentions were good…

One might go further and say that no matter how well-intentioned, the use of per-suasion and mind control to get someone to do anything against their will, no matter how seemingly benign, is unethical. I am of this leaning.

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I would put forth that there are a great number of things people know deep in their hearts that they should do, yet for various reasons (be they social, motivational, emotional or otherwise) they cannot bring themselves to do so.

In my opinion, the ethical application of mind control or influence occurs when through its application you simply give someone the psychological freedom to do some-thing they truly want to do.

You may be selling a product that someone truly needs. They know they need it. You know they need it. Yet, there is something blocking them from making this correct deci-sion. You can then apply these techniques and let them choose again - when the power of your influence may be stronger than that which is preventing them from making a deci-sion.

You may be deeply in love with someone - and they may be in love with you, but for various reasons they may not be able to express this love. Is it wrong to use the power of persuasion to tear down these barriers?

In my opinion, truly giving someone the ability to choose is what separates the ethical application of persuasion from the unethical application of these ideas. We could say "only for good purposes" or "only for things that benefit them," but these ideas are so nebulous and of such universal contention (go to a bar some time and engage people in a discussion of "what is good for them") that their discussion becomes moot. Further, many acts which are widely regarded as horrible have been perpetrated in the name of "what is good" or "what is ethical."

I'll say it again: truly giving someone the ability to choose is what separates the ethical application of persuasion from the unethical application of these ideas.

This is why I love the Internet so much. When looking at a web page, it is impossible for the marketer to apply the sometimes-demeaning strong-arm tactics used in face-to-face selling.

With all this said, I am quite certain these ideas will be used for nefarious purposes. However, I feel it's better to make these concepts public knowledge as those who truly wish ill-will on people will find ways to do so with or without my help.

In closing, one may say "If truly giving someone the ability to choose is the ethical mea-suring stick of persuasion - why use the words 'mind control' in your title?"

You'll learn more about this later, but in short, these words have been chosen to create a certain amount of curiosity and excitement in your mind.

Did it work?

Well, you're reading this aren't you?

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P a r t O n e : P s y c h o l o g y

“The controlling intelligence understands its own nature, and what it does, and whereon it works.”

- Marcus Aurelius

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Conformity to Group Norms

Humans, like cattle, tend to move in herds. In action and opinions, Homo sapiens are natural followers. We like to act and think in groups.

Looking at twentieth-century history alone, there are numerous examples of herd decision-making, both good and catastrophic. In the 1930's, our herd instincts in per-sonal financial behavior plunged a nation into the Great Depression. During that same generation, another herd followed Hitler as he sowed the seeds for World War II.

The Nazi era, in fact, provides an important case study of herd behavior at work. Many people attribute the atrocities of the Third Reich to Hitler's personal charisma. In individual homes, however, Hitler's power meant far less than people's fears over what their friends and neighbors were thinking.

Interviewed years later, German citizens were asked why they turned in their dis-sident neighbors to the authorities. It wasn't because they loved Hitler, they said. It was, instead, the fear of being seen as group outsiders...

The existence of group-think has even been verified scientifically. In 1935, Psychologist Mazafer Sherif took a group of people into a dark room and asked them to look at a tiny point of light in the distance.

This group became test subjects in the study of a phenomenon called the "Autokinetic Effect." You can test this effect yourself. Look at a stationary point of light in a dark room and the light may appear to wobble at times. (For some real fun, try this at a party and see how people react relative to those around them.)

In Sherif's experiment, the test subjects were asked, first individually and then as a group, if the light was moving or stationary. As individuals, opinion was almost equally divided: about half saying they saw movement.

As soon as they were put together as a group, though, their individuality began to vanish. The answer given by most of the subjects was highly dependent upon the overall opinion of the group. People tended to agree with the prevailing majority, even if they had to recant on their first answer.

Then, when asked a third and final time as individuals, the subjects tended to hold on to the opinion of their group over their own previous individual view.

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Now, let's take this knowledge about herd behavior and put it to productive use.

The Internet is full of herds. At first glance, you wouldn't think this to be the case. Internet users tend to be more savvy, more discerning, and better educated (though this distinction is changing as Internet use becomes more widespread).

Internet users are also spread throughout the globe, not packed together in a dark room looking at a point of light.

Nonetheless, there are herds to be found on the Internet pasture.

The key point you need to realize, though, is that these herds are invisible until a clever thinker comes forth and defines them.

Let's put this in more concrete terms. You offer products and services that you believe are the best in your industry. There are tens, hundreds, maybe even thousands of people who have used your products and services and believe, just like you do, that what you're offering is the best to be found.

This is your herd. And others - your prospects - will follow once they see that your herd exists.

It’s up to you to define the existence of the herd and show it to your prospects.

Show your potential clients and customers that others have gained tremendous satisfaction from your product line, and your prospect will tend to follow the herd. It's human nature to go with the crowd, instead of striking out alone into uncharted waters.

Not only will seeing your herd increase the likeliness that your prospects will do business with you, but it will also increase their satisfaction after the purchase as well.

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1. Conformity to Group Norms 3

Principle:

Conformity to Group Norms. Humans, like lemmings and cows, tend to follow the herd - both in action and opinion.

Lesson:

Identify and then clearly define your herd to influence future herd members. Think: testimonials, case studies, success stories.

Testimonials: "'Mark Joyner is the Tiger Woods of Internet Marketing' Mike Litman, host of Business Breakthroughs Radio Show"

Success Stories: "ExitBlaze.com is a free viral traffic building tool I built in 2,001. Jerome Chapman started using it on a Friday and by Monday morning, 2,337 people had visited his site as a result."

Action:

Aggressively compile information about your herd and display this informa-tion for all to see. If you don't have a herd, then you need to create one. Make happy customers. Make friends in discussion groups and chat rooms. By creat-ing a unique and stellar service that exceeds expectations and, in every way, wows your customers, you will swiftly generate a herd worth boasting about.

Key Term: "Herd"

Any group that moves together. Human beings and cattle for example. Your herd is your happy customer base. Others will follow this herd if they know it exists.

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Lemmings. Depression Era Businessmen. Nazis. All cases of herd-like behavior. Conformity to Group Norms in action? Can you think of any other examples? (OK, lemmings don't really follow each other off of cliffs, but this incorrect pop-science provides an apt metaphor.)

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Scientific experiments have shown that the opinion of the group influences the opinion of the individual.

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Why is no one saying "me too"?

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You may know there are thousands of people happily using your product, but have you assumed that your prospect already knows this?

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If you "define" the existence of a group, you can influence people to conform to that group. The use of testimonials is one way to define such groups. By showing that other people are happy with your products, your prospects will be more likely to set aside their fears and say "me, too."

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Obedience to Authority

If a command comes from the mouth of authority, we tend to obey.

This rule has always been in effect, even during the rebellious 1960's when we thought hippies believed in nothing more than drugs, free love and their own tie-dyed brand of anarchy.

Actually, members of the "turned on" generation were just as slavish to authority as their buttoned-down parents. The difference was, instead of listening to the admonitions of Lyndon Johnson, they were worshipping at the altar of Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Garcia.

Obedience to authority was demonstrated vividly in 1965 in the laboratory of a scien-tist named Stanley Milgram. He recruited a group of young college students and directed them to help him conduct some important research.

Little did they know, the students themselves were the subjects of Dr. Milgram's research.

Milgram told the students that he was conducting psychological research on the effects of punishment on learning. Each student, one at a time, would enter Milgram's lab to find a lab assistant holding a clipboard and a man sitting in an adjacent, glassed-off room connected via intercom. The man in the glass room sat in a chair with electrodes attached to his head and body. The students didn't know it, but the wired-up man in the glass room was a paid actor.

As the "experiment" began, the lab assistant would ask the actor a series of questions. Each time the actor answered incorrectly, the student was directed to give the actor an electric shock. With each wrong answer, the electric shock was to increase in intensity. Of course, there was no electricity and the actor was convincingly yelping in pain, but the student subject didn't know any of this.

The experiment progressed with the voltage of the "shocks" increasing and the actor's yelps of pain transforming into screams of terror. Toward the end of the experiment, it became apparent to the student subject that the actor (who the student thought was the real subject of the experiment) was in critical condition and that further shocks would probably kill him.

The student was told with authority that it was OK to go ahead. This was an "officially-sanctioned" experiment, and they would not be legally or ethically liable for whatever happened.

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2Yes Sir, No Sir, Would You Like My Credit Card Number, Sir?

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Amazingly, 62 percent of the students taking part in this experiment were willing to administer the fatal shock.

They knowingly took the life of another human being, simply because someone in authority said it was alright to do so. (Or at least they thought they were taking someone’s life, and that’s all that matters when considering the psychology that drove their behavior.)

Later, the experiment was repeated using people drawn from all walks of life, and the out-come was the same as had been observed among the students.

Compared to killing someone, using authority to close a sale ought to be a cinch, shouldn't it? (It certainly gives a better understanding of the Creedence Clearwater Revival lyrics from 1969, "If I were a politician, I could prove that monkeys talk...")

Authority will work for you - incredibly well - as a sales tool.

I learned this principle myself back in 1995 when the Internet was just beginning to boom. I had been in the e-commerce game for about a year, publishing an e-mail newsletter about doing business online while still serving as an Army officer during the day. At the time, I had a few hundred subscribers.

One day, I called a customer about an order and introduced myself. The lady on the other end of the phone blurted out, "Oh my God! You mean this is THE Mark Joyner? I can't believe it!"

OK, now I wasn't exactly Hugh Hefner lounging in my silk pajamas calling Playboy sub-scribers to renew their subscriptions. Mark Joyner, at that time, was a GI sitting in his under-wear (not silk) in his Oklahoma living room. Over time, my name did become quite well-known across the Net, but in 1995 I was still an obscure figure.

She went on to explain how she avidly read every issue of my e-mail newsletter. It dawned on me that, intentionally or not, I had become an authority to this woman and oth-ers who read my words. She probably would have followed any reasonable business advice I gave her at that moment.

Did I take advantage of this woman's thrall over my "authority" to sell her some products? You're damn right I did. Why not? Of course, what I sold her was a great product she genu-inely needed - I simply wouldn't have used my influence in this way otherwise.

If you need a visual reminder of the importance of authority, rent the movie “Finding Forrester.” In it, the young protege asks Sean Connery's character, "If I write a book, will women have sex with me?" Connery replies, "Women will have sex with you if you write a bad book."

Putting words in print conveys a certain authority. Putting your words on a web page does the same thing. Make yourself an authority and use it to your best advantage.

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Concept:

Obedience to Authority. If a command comes from the mouth of an authority we recognize, we tend to obey.

Lesson:

Partner with, wield and create authority on the Internet to influence your pros-pects. Think: articles, endorsements, product reviews, product awards, certifica-tions...

Articles: I wrote an article for a well-read Internet publication called Internet Day in 1998 (created by my friend Mel Strocen - a very clever entrepreneur who knows how to turn email subscribers into money). There was a link at the bottom of the article that recommended my full-length course on Internet Marketing (killertac-tics.com). That single link was responsible for selling 45 copies of the course in one day. If that link had not appeared at the bottom of the article, would it have been as effective? My testing says “no.”

Endorsements: If you heard that Arnold Schwartzenager said eating spinach was the single most important factor in building his physique, would you eat more spinach? Note that the more credible the endorsement the more effective. If Pavarotti said the same thing, it would have a different effect entirely.

Product Awards: An electronic book I wrote years ago, "Search Engine Tactics," was given a "5 Star" award by ZDNet - the only electronic book ever to receive this award normally reserved for software applications. I used this fact to gain more credibility and respect for the book. Subsequently, the book had been download-ed over 1,000,000 times when we stopped counting in 1998.

Certifications: If you were selecting a web host for your website, do you think an official looking certification from a professional organization would influence your decision to choose them? What if it said, "Certified for 99.9% up time by the Web Host Excellence Board"?

Action:

Immediately begin positioning yourself as an authority in your field. You can do this by writing a newsletter that offers helpful information to your prospects. Then, you can use your authority to generate revenue by recommending prod-ucts.

Be careful, though. Authority can be squandered just as surely as it can be acquired. If you abuse your authority by recommending products you wouldn't use yourself, your position as an authority figure will be short- lived.

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Who were the real rebels?

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People respond so strongly to authority that they can be coaxed to do even the most wicked acts if the authority assures them it is OK.

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The funny thing about authority is that two people can speak authoritatively and matter-of-factly about concepts that seem to contradict one another. Makes you wonder about the nature of knowledge…

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You can establish yourself as an authority and no one needs to be the wiser about who you "really" are. And why should they know? Even the Pope goes to the bathroom…

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The Foot in the Door Phenomenon

Get someone to agree to a small thing. That's the first, and most essential, step toward getting them to agree to a large thing later.

It's called “The Foot in the Door Phenomenon,” and it's one of the most impor-tant rules you can learn about Internet marketing, a field in which you're always just one mouse click away from rejection.

Even beyond the Net, you can see the Foot in the Door Phenomenon at work every day. Many religious organizations and cults are masters of the art. You will never see a Scientologist asking someone on the street if they would like to spend thousands of dollars on a lifetime of therapy. They'll simply ask you if you want to take a personality or IQ test. You don’t know it at the time, but when you take that test you’re also taking part in a very well-scripted system designed to get you deeper and deeper into Scientology.

Likewise, neo-Nazis and other hate groups know they can't build their organizations by making cold calls to ask people to participate in hate crimes. Recruitment starts with a meeting or a party, before more nefarious activities are introduced.

The number of steps between a personality test and blind devotion are surpris-ingly few.

(Essential disclaimer: I'm not putting down any religious or political movement for their beliefs or suggesting that their constitutional freedom of speech should be limited. I'm just comparing sales processes, and leaving my readers the right to draw their own conclusions.)

It would also do you well to pay attention to some of the world's best practitio-ners of sneaky psychological tricks: door-to-door salesmen. If you ever have one ring your doorbell, don't automatically slam the door in his face. Let him play out his shtick and learn some lessons from him.

Let's take vacuum cleaner salesmen, for example.

If someone walks up to a strange house and asks the residents if they would like to buy a vacuum cleaner, they won't get a foot in the door. A door in the face is more like it.

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3Fending Off Your Mouse Click to Oblivion

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Door-to-door salesmen have learned from years of trial and error that you've got to start small before you can sell big.

The effective vacuum cleaner salesman will come to a door and say, "Excuse me, ma'am. We're here today helping people out in the neighborhood. Would you mind if we vacuumed your living room carpet? It's free of charge and there is no obligation." (A similar technique is the "cold" sales call in which the potential customer is told they have "won" a free carpet cleaning.)

Once the salesman gets his foot in the door, the show begins. The free cleaning is actually a sales presentation for the vacuum itself. Once someone is in your home, you're overcome with a natural sense of hospitality and a reluctance to ask them to leave empty-handed. You would be astounded at how frequently these door-to-door professionals close the sale.

It's tougher on the Internet. You don't have the advantage of being physically inside a person's space and they can zap you off your computer screen in a second without a speck of remorse. The web surfer doesn't even have to be polite to you.

Nevertheless, the same principle applies. On the Net, getting a foot in the door and keeping it there means that you must get your customers' attention and then provide them with something of sufficient value to keep them interested.

When you do this, you've got to put some thought, planning and research behind it. Before the dot-com shakeup, many would-be Internet entrepreneurs thought you could strike it rich on the Net simply by offering something for free. They thought the money would just roll in. Instead, they're busy combing through the "Help Wanted" ads today.

"Free" does work. Make no mistake about it: people will always love the prospect of getting something for nothing.

But, it's got to be part of your foot-in-the-door sales strategy. You don't give some-thing away without having a firm strategy for guiding your target customers to the next step.

I have a formula for this. I call it, "Target, Tie-In and Collect."

Target your foot-in-the-door approach toward a prospect who you know will be interested in your products. Smart door-to-door vacuum salesmen wouldn't waste their time on people with hardwood floors. Your free offer should only be of interest to someone who would clearly be interested in your products. Offering a free tea-cozy would not be a good way to find people to purchase your carburetor-cleaner.

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3. The Foot in the Door Phenomenon

Tie-In your sales process once you have your foot in the door. Create a compelling, desirable linear path from freebie to closing. The vacuum guys did this seamlessly. As they vacuumed your carpet for free, they talked up the wonders of the machine. Only then did it become clear a sales pitch was taking place.

Collect contact information from your prospects. You may not get them immedi-ately with your tie-in, but you can always pick up a few more sales with well-executed follow-up.

In my career, the use of foot-in-the-door strategies has enabled me to build e-mail lists with hundreds of thousands of names. With their permission, I contact these pros-pects again and again with further foot-in-the-door gambits. The repeat readership on these lists is quite high. Every time I get my foot in the door, I give something valuable (and of genuine interest) to the reader.

On the Net, names and e-mail addresses are gold (NOTE: if you don’t have permis-sion to contact them, though, they are “Fool’s Gold”). Once you get your foot in the door, you've got the opportunity to make money again and again.

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Concept:

The Foot in the Door Phenomenon. Get someone to agree to a small thing first, and it will be much easier to get them to agree to a large thing later.

Lesson: Use simple, compelling hooks to draw prospects into your sales process. The hook should not obligate the prospect in any way, or it may scare them off. Use my formula, "Target, Tie-In and Collect" to render the best result from your foot-in-the-door gambit.

An ad for a health club: "Come in for a free body-fat analysis."

An ad for aluminum siding: "Is your home at risk? Let our Home Repair Specialists visit your home for a free weather risk assessment."

Action:

Analyze your product and develop a "target, tie-in, collect" free offer. Use this to generate subscriptions to the newsletter you developed in Chapter 2.

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3. The Foot in the Door Phenomenon 2 1

If you get a chance to observe any recruiting process at all - drop everything and study every aspect of it. There is much to learn about the human mind there…

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Your foot-in-the-door approach will be even more effective if you make the "small task" something that is of great interest to the prospect.

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3. The Foot in the Door Phenomenon 2 3

It's easy for web surfers to close a door in your face - because they don't even see your face. In their minds, there is no harm done by ignoring you.

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Remember: Make it easy, avoid a sense of obligation, and "target, tie-in, and collect."

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The Zeigarnik Effect

People don't like it when things are left incomplete. It makes us feel uncomfort-able.

If something is unfinished, it keeps our attention until we can bring closure to it. Let's flash back to the final weeks of the year 2000. What was all of America dis-

cussing? We were obsessing over the presidential election. The world was on edge, waiting to see if Al Gore or George W. Bush would be occupying the Oval Office. People who normally couldn't give a damn about politics could talk about nothing else but the intricacies of Florida election procedures.

Why? Because we get uncomfortable - and intrigued - when things are incom-plete. George W. Bush's acceptance speech, once the election was finally resolved, was one of the most widely-watched news events in history. We are magnetically drawn to stories with uncertain conclusions.

This phenomenon is called the Zeigarnik effect. Years ago, a researcher named Bluma Zeigarnik was fascinated by food servers, amazed that they could remember lengthy lists of ordered items and be able to match them with the right customers. She noticed that this complex information would completely disappear from the server's mind once the food was delivered to the table.

My theory is that the incompleteness of the task at hand - the yet-to-be-fulfilled food order - created a state of imbalance in the server's mind. We know, from Gestalt Psychology, that organisms move toward a state of equilibrium. The lack of equilibri-um associated with an unfulfilled task creates discomfort and causes that task to stay in the server's memory until completed.

Zeigarnik took this work a step further. She gathered several test subjects and had them perform a series of tasks, not allowing them to complete all of them. She found, in interviewing the subjects, that the incomplete tasks were consistently remembered with greater frequency and intricate detail.

This is known as the Zeigarnik Effect, and it has tremendous implications for Internet marketers. As an Internet marketer myself, I am floored by something else altogether ...

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Something almost sexual in nature. Something every one of us has in our bed-rooms …

STOP RIGHT THERE!

Notice how you're moving rapidly on to read the next sentence.

The Zeigarnik Effect is at work in your own mind. When I ended the paragraph above with the phrase "something else altogether ...," I left some unfinished business on your mental plate. I then intensified this by painting a picture around this blank spot in your mind.

It would have made you uncomfortable to stop reading at this moment and leave that unfinished business hanging.

Is the relevance to successful Internet marketing becoming clear? Used properly, the Zeigarnik Effect provides the kind of psychological edge to get

your foot firmly in the door of any web surfer and keep him moving inevitably deeper into your sales process.

You begin telling a story that attracts a potential customer's attention, and make him keep following you in search of a satisfying conclusion.

If you still have doubts about the efficacy of this approach, turn your television on to CNN “Headline News” sometime. Every half hour, “Headline News” leads into their sports report with a trivia question. Maybe you don't give a rat's ass about sports, but odds are that you're going to sit through the entire sports broadcast and two sets of commercials to hear the answer to the trivia question.

If this works for sports trivia, imagine its potency if you tell a housewife that there is a common household item that can harm their families. That housewife will follow you with great persistence and determination to find out the answer to the mystery you've placed before her.

An unfinished story can be one of your greatest assets.

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4. The Zeigarnik Effect 2 7

Concept:

The Zeigarnik Effect. People are uncomfortable when something is left incom-plete.

Lesson:

Use this knowledge to lead people into your sales process. Pose questions that can only be answered by reading your ad copy.

From a highly successful website (killertactics.com): "There are five tactics your Internet business must employ immediately if you want to prosper in the next 90 days. Does your business employ all 5?" Remember the online marketing course I told you about in Chapter 1? This tagline was part of our most success-ful ad campaign for selling the course ever. My testing indicates that ads with a Zeigarnik Effect tend to out-pull those that don't have one. Zeigarnik can be used at virtually any step of your sales process to pull people along.

Action: Analyze your marketing efforts. Can you think of ways to employ the Zeigarnik Effect to compel people to stick with you? Remember, the longer you keep them reading your ad copy, the likelihood of a successful sale increases expo-nentially. COPYRIG

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Quick quiz: What was the name of O.J.'s attorney? OK, now name your congressman. See what I mean? The O.J. Simpson trial was probably one of the longest running exercises in Zeigarnik ever.

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4. The Zeigarnik Effect 2 9

The Zeigarnik Effect

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Incomplete tasks are painful - even if we don't particularly care about the outcome.

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Cognitive Dissonance

Besides things that are left incomplete, there is something else that makes us uncomfortable.

We don't like it when our actions conflict with our thoughts.

We want logical, sound reasons for the actions we take so that we can always jus-tify those actions in our own minds.

Case in point: I was serving in the U.S. Army Military Intelligence Corp in Korea in 1992. Among the many interesting things I observed there was the rise and fall of an end-of-the-world cult. The "Church of the Living Stone Mission for the Coming Days" predicted that Jesus would return to earth on October 28, 1992. Many of the cult's followers went so far as to sell their homes and personal belongings, shedding their earthly burdens before their planned ascension to Heaven.

Well, to the best of our knowledge, there was no celestial Rapture on that October day. Members of the cult, though, would not admit error. They offered a myriad of irrational reasons for Jesus's failure to show up.

This persistent desire to avoid admitting error goes to incredible extremes.

Members of the notorious "Heaven's Gate" cult (remember, the ones found dead in their bunk beds wearing black Nikes, with their bags packed to join the outer space aliens who would be swinging by to pick them up) still claim that the cult's teachings were accurate. Surviving members are still quoted as saying, "I wish I had gone with them."

If the human thought process places such importance on being right, that death is preferable to admitting error, don't you think we should be putting this knowledge to use?

In 1951, an insightful thinker named Leon Festinger studied people who had a near-religious devotion to automobiles. He showed his test subjects pictures and specifications of cars and asked them to select the one they thought was best. After making their selections, Festinger showed them advertisements for each of the cars. Inevitably, each subject would spend far greater time looking at ads for the cars they had selected.

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People will go to great lengths to prove to themselves that they have made the right decision, says Festinger's “Theory of Cognitive Dissonance”. It's simply too painful to view evidence that we're wrong.

If we can provide potential customers with compelling reasons and sound evidence that they are making the right choice, it becomes that much easier for them to pull the trigger on that decision.

Internet customers tend to be a bit more discerning than the average buyer. On the Net, consumers take advantage of the world of information at their fingertips and absorb more material before they make their buying decision. Before you close a deal with an Internet consumer, you had better be sure that you've addressed all of their questions and potential fears.

In other words, assure them that they won't have to worry about being wrong.

This lesson holds true in everyday life. Social psychologist Ellen Langer conducted a well-known experiment in which students were sent to cut in line to use a very busy library copy machine. Those that simply asked to cut in were turned away about half of the time.

However, those that offered a reason - even an embarrassingly lame reason ("can I cut in front of you, because I need to make some copies") - were allowed to cut in more than nine out of every 10 times they asked. People were willing to delay their own progress to the copy machine, as long as they were given a reason (even a bad one) that would justify the decision in their own minds.

Make certain your customers have the information they need to justify their buying decisions.

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5. Cognitive Dissonance 3 3

Concept:

Cognitive Dissonance. People are uncomfortable when their beliefs and actions are in conflict. They don't want to find out their beliefs are wrong.

From a TV Commercial: "4 out of 5 dentists surveyed recommended…" So, were only 5 dentists surveyed in this very scientific piece of logical justification? Notice it doesn't specify, but people are still swayed by this example.

From a sales letter: We offer a product called "Webmaster Multi-Tool" that auto-mates a number of various marketing tasks for Internet entrepreneurs. The product is actually quite good, and we stand behind it, but some of the reasons we give people to persuade them to buy it are not always fully explained in the ad copy. Yet, it's still quite effective … See the URL below for more:http://www.webmastermultitool.com/compare.htm

Lesson:

Make it easier for your prospects to make a buying decision by giving them reasons to do so. They will be more comfortable with the decision since the rea-sons you gave them will make it easier to defend their spending choices.

Action:

Analyze your ad copy and ask if you have provided your prospect with reasons and justifications for their purchase. These reasons must be compelling. Use scientific data, quotes from experts, polling research - any kind of concrete, credible information to justify a buying decision.

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Even in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary, we tend to hold fast to our "beliefs."

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"Subjects spent far more time looking at the ads for the cars they chose."

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What the unconscious mind thinks before making a buying decision.

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The lame excuse "because I need to make some copies" was accepted almost as frequently as the seemingly plausible excuse, "because my professor will fail me if I don't get this back to him in 5 minutes." The existence of the word "because" seems to make it easier for us to accept commands.

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Conformity to Emotions

Just like how herd instinct affects the way we act and form opinions, we also like our emotions to mirror those expressed by others in our group.

Marketing experts have used this knowledge with great success for years.

The marketing whizzes for Coke, Pepsi and the rest of the soft drink indus-try found out long ago that adding happy, smiling faces to their imagery would increase sales of their products. The idea is a simple, but effective one. If Joe Consumer associates happy people with Coke, then he will make the subconscious assumption that he, too, will be much happier if he drinks a Coke.

Never underestimate the importance of demonstrating that your products and services will make people feel happy and more fulfilled.

I've tried this approach myself and can testify that it works.

Once, I ran a split-run test of two websites selling Internet marketing software. The two sites were identical in every way, except for one key facet. On one site, I had images of somber, serious business people using the software. On the other, I used images of happy, ecstatic software users.

The site with the smiling faces pulled nearly 60 percent better than the dead

serious site.

Clearly, people want to associate themselves with others who have found the keys to happiness and delight.

The television industry has long been aware of this concept. For years, virtually every single situation comedy on network television has had a "laugh track." That's the recorded canned laughter that the show's producers play every time one of the characters has a funny line.

We've grown so accustomed to the laugh track that we hardly notice its pres-ence when we watch a show. It's amazing, though, how many of us laugh at the most hackneyed, lame jokes simply because we hear the sound of other people chuckling.

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It's truly amazing - and critical to understand - how we like to mirror the emotions of those around us.

In 1962, the research team of Schater and Singer gave people epinephrine, a drug that is known to intensify emotions, and locked them in a room with other test subjects - one of which was a hired actor.

Some of the test subjects were placed in a room with an actor who was told to act angry. Others shared their room with an actor who was instructed to act absolutely giddy with glee.

Without exception, the test subjects mirrored the emotions of the actors in the room with them.

This is information that you need to use with some degree of restraint. People want to be happy, not goofy. If you go over the top showing people in unrestrained ecstacy, you lose credibility and any prospects of a sale. People want to feel happy, but they also want the assurance of knowing they are handing their credit card numbers to a level-headed professional organization.

A simple image of a smiling, satisfied customer can have a tremendous, albeit sub-tle, impact on closing a sale.

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Concept:

Conformity to Emotions. People tend to mirror the emotions of the group around them.

Lesson:

If people associate happy images with your products, they may assume that purchasing your products will make them happy as well.

From Television Commercials: "Have a Coke and a smile." "So, put on a Windex shine." (new lyrics for the song "Put on a Happy Face") Action:

When appropriate, try to incorporate a happy and upbeat tone into your adver-tising, but do it professionally. This is a tough, but critical, balance. The type of emotions you display must also be dictated by the type of product or service you're selling. The grins shown on faces consuming breakfast cereals won't, obviously, help a funeral home sell its services. Find the value in showing visu-als of emotions - whether those emotions are radiant happiness or serene, assured confidence.

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The comedy soap-opera parody "Soap" did not have a laugh track - many people did not like the show because they said they couldn't tell if it was a comedy or a soap opera…

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6. Conformity to Emotions 4 3

They thought the effects of a drug were being tested. However…

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The test subjects were all given the drug epinephrine - the only difference being that one room had an actor who was instructed to act happy - the other room had an actor who was instructed to act like he was irritable. People tended to follow the lead of the actor.

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6. Conformity to Emotions 4 5

If you can make people feel good about doing business with you, it will be easier for them to make that buying decision.

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But don't take the concept of "happiness" too far. People also want to rest assured that the people to whom they are giving money are credible and trustworthy…

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Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

It can be argued that everything we do is motivated by our desire to satisfy certain basic needs. Let's set up a hypothetical example of how this knowledge comes into play.

You have just created a revolutionary product, a new innovation that will help businesses produce more at less cost.

The world is ready to beat a path to your doorstep.

You identify your potential customers, you prime them to hear your sales pitch, and you launch into it by saying, "Our product automates supply chains with bottom-up six sigma inte-gration ..."

Ballgame's over in the first inning. You've already lost. You may have the world's greatest product, but you haven't convinced anyone that they need it in order to enrich their lives.

You haven't addressed your customers' basic human needs.

Years ago, a gentleman named Abram Maslow developed a theory on human motivation based upon what he termed, "The Hierarchy of Needs."

Maslow argued that all human action is spent, either directly or indirectly, in pursuing the satisfaction of these needs. They have a definite hierarchy. Once we satisfy a lower need on the scale, we immediately begin working to satisfy the next, more sophisticated need.

As an aside, you'll notice that money doesn't have a specific place on this pyramid. Money is a symbol, not a need in itself. For most of us, money is a tool that represents safety and security.

Think of every decision, every action we take in life ... when you step back and really ana-lyze it, it's quite easy to see where Maslow is coming from. In fact, it would be quite easy to argue that everything we do is for the satisfaction of one of our fundamental human needs.

Even acts that seem irrational - I'm thinking of the homicidal kids at Columbine High School in Colorado who called themselves "The Trench Coat Mafia" - can stem from a perceived need to belong and be accepted, and a need to strike out at those who frustrate the pursuit of that need.

** Turn page for diagram

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Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs

1) Physiological: hunger, thirst, bodily comforts, etc. 2) Safety/security: out of danger 3) Belongingness and Love: affiliate with others, be accepted 4) Esteem: to achieve, be competent, gain approval and recognition 5) Cognitive: to know, to understand, and explore 6) Aesthetic: symmetry, order, and beauty 7) Self-actualization: to find self-fulfillment and real-ize one's potential 8) Transcendence: to help others find self-fulfillment and realize their potential

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7. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs 4 9

If you are seeking to sell a product or service, you absolutely must find a way to appeal to the needs of your customers.

My friend, Brian Tracy, (a world-leading sales expert and a truly captivating speaker) says that the first step of the sales process is to demonstrate to the buyer that they have a need for the product. The next step is to intensify the need.

Let's backtrack to that example I used at the beginning of this lesson. Could the salesman have started his pitch with a stronger appeal?

Well, it could be argued that he "called out to his specific target audience" from the first line - and this is, indeed, a very important concept. However, you can call out to your target audience and address human needs at the same time.

What if, instead, he had said, "Our product will save you time and money by auto-mating your supply chain. Imagine what you will do with all this extra time. How much more will you accomplish when you and your supply chain managers can devote more attention to other opportunities? How much additional profit will that generate for you?"

With those words, you're in the game with a better chance to win. You've linked your product to the satisfaction of vital needs - time, profit, success, security.

I never - repeat, never - make a sales pitch without keeping Maslow's Hierarchy foremost in mind. When discussing your product, you will succeed by breaking each feature down in terms of how it can help satisfy your customers' basic needs.

Or, better yet, lay out the facts and benefits of your product line so vividly that the customers can draw the conclusions themselves.

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Concept:

Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Everything we do is motivated by a desire to sat-isfy certain basic needs.

Lesson:

In every sales technique you utilize, associate your products and services with the satisfaction of essential human needs.

Need for belonging: "Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there." "Fly the friendly skies of United."

Need for sex: "Nothing comes between me and my Calvins. Nothing." (The famous commercial with the young Brook Shields in Calvin Klein jeans - imply-ing that she was not wearing any underwear.)

Action:

Review all of the verbiage you use in your web site, your e-mails, your newslet-ters. If your wording is so focused on processes and functions without atten-tion being paid to basic human needs, you need to revamp your approach. Ensure that every word you use is aimed at satisfying at least one of the levels on our hierarchy of needs.COPYRIG

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7. Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs 51

Perhaps the need to belong to "the group" is more important than we realize.

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Tell people how your products and services will satisfy their basic needs. "What's in it for me is not enough." That "what" needs to be something important to your prospect. Maslow's Hierarchy can help you determine what is important.

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Framing

The way people react to information is as dependent on the presentation of the information as it is on the substance of the information - if not more so.

We all like to say that we don't buy products based on the packaging, but when it comes to information, the way people react is greatly dependent on the way that information is packaged and presented.

In other words, it's not mere coincidence that female news anchors on local TV stations all have perfectly-kept hair and the shiniest smiles modern dentistry can provide.

For years, astute professionals have understood that information makes a big-ger impact if it's expertly framed.

Richard Nixon understood this.

In 1952, more than two decades before Watergate branded him forever as "Tricky Dick," Richard Nixon performed one of the greatest feats of political jujitsu the nation had ever seen.

It was in the midst of the 1952 presidential campaign. Nixon was running for Vice President on the ticket headed by Dwight Eisenhower. The Eisenhower-Nixon ticket looked like a shoe-in until allegations arose concerning an alleged political slush fund that Nixon's rich buddies had created for him.

Nixon simply denied the allegations, but people weren't buying it. The pres-sure became so intense that even Republican Party heavyweights were urging Nixon to step down and let someone else take his place at Ike's side.

Nixon knew that his political survival depended upon giving the American people something they could embrace and defend. He did that by delivering on national television his famous "Checkers" speech. In this address, he made the claim that the only gift he had ever received as a politician was a little cocker span-iel named Checkers.

Who, after all, could ever fault a politician for accepting a puppy for his little girls?

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After the speech, Nixon was transformed from a run-of-the-mill dishonest politician to Mr. Middle America. People called and wired telegrams to GOP offices, enthusiasti-cally urging that Nixon be kept on the ticket.

This was a fascinating example of psychological manipulation at work. In terms of substantive information, Nixon didn't say anything at all new. Nonetheless, his popular approval shot through the roof.

A student of Neuro Linguistic Programming (NLP) might say that Richard Nixon had "reframed' himself.

NLP emerged in 1975 as the brainchild of a young graduate student of computer programming named Richard Bandler and a linguistics professor named John Grinder. Their work at the University of Santa Cruz was surrounded by controversy since its inception, but it remains a fascinating study.

(NLP may be surrounded in controversy, but there is no denying that it offers some tremendously powerful ideas. Some accuse it of being a “pseudo-science” derivative of other fields [like Ericksonian Hypnotherapy], but I will give my own disclaimer. I've met Richard Bandler a few times and have known one of his top students, John Lavalle, for years. They’ve both been great to me, and after studying both NLP, Ericksonian Hypnotherapy, and many related fields, I still point people to NLP for further study in influence and human behavior.)

Study NLP and you learn the concept of framing, how to package a message to make it more appealing, as well as many other immensely useful concepts.

Here’s a real world example that further demonstrates the power of “framing”: Imagine that you're walking down a street and you encounter a shabby-looking, unbathed artist trying to peddle his paintings on canvas. He yells at you, "Hey, man, buy my painting!"

You would walk by while trying to avoid eye contact.

Now, take that very same painting off the street, put it in a beautiful gilded frame and place it on a wall in a swanky Manhattan gallery. Imagine, as well, two attractive people flanking the artwork and talking about how much they admire it. The gallery owner strides toward you and asks you if you were interested in buying the painting.

Does your viewpoint toward the painting change?

If you're absolutely honest, you'll admit that you are going to give that painting much more serious consideration in the posh gallery than you ever would on a street corner. (The social liberals among you will insist that you would never judge artwork poorly just because it's being peddled by a street person. If that's the case, then I urge

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8. Framing

you to e-mail me at [email protected] to tell me your first-person story of the evening in which you invite that street artist to dinner in your home. I suspect my mailbox won't be filling up with these stories any time soon.)

It's human nature. The "frame" in which information is presented greatly influences the way in which that information is perceived and accepted.

When you're running an Internet business, framing is absolutely critical.Your success depends heavily on how your website is perceived. People may look

upon you and your company with great respect after viewing your site. By contrast, they may see you as a big joke and never come back. Everything about your site - wording, design, how material is organized - must frame your message in the way you want it to be received.

For example, a website selling a product is going to have to make claims about what that product can do. Surround those claims with a frame of authority, credibility, believability and trustworthiness, and that message will result in increasing sales.

Your concerns can't stop, though, at the way your site is constructed. You also need to be acutely conscious of how potential customers get to your site. The path they travel will frame their perceptions as well.

For example, a positive review for your product with a link to your site will result in a very receptive customer inclined to make a purchase from you. A negative review of your product may bring you some curious browsers, much more skeptical and less inclined to part ways with their money at your site.

In 1995, I coined a phrase that is now an Internet Marketing Truism: "All clicks are not created equal."

A click that frames your site poorly will bring you poor responses. A click that frames your site well brings you receptive customers and clients. The effect of the route taken to get to your site is of dramatic importance, so much so that you should monitor it in your market testing (using tracking tools such as those found at ROIbot.com).

Think of your own buying habits. If you walk into a store that is dirty, poorly-orga-

nized, with ill-informed employees and located in a bad neighborhood, you're likely to walk right back out the door. By contrast, you're probably more likely to take your credit card out of your wallet in a well-lit, smartly laid-out business with a crack staff waiting on you.

A website is no different, and you need to be thinking about how you can be fram-ing yours to amplify your message.

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Concept:

Framing. The way people react to a message is highly dependent on the man-ner and context in which it is presented.

Lesson:

Success in Internet marketing is affected by how well a website is packaged. Another critical element in framing involves the links that bring customers to a website.

From our ROIbot.com affiliate program testing: The ROIbot.com affiliate pro-gram is one of the largest and most successful on the Net. We've tested many various types of affiliate advertisements and in the process, we were able to prove once again the importance of this concept. For example, many affiliate programs will advertise a "conversion rate" (ratio of website visitors to sales) for their websites. We've found that this is an entirely useless figure and has no jus-tification in reality. That is, the conversion rate of a website can not be viewed in a vacuum, independent of the manner in which a visitor arrives at the site.

A classic example of this was demonstrated by a split-run test we ran with two affiliate advertisements. One group of affiliates was asked to display "advertise-ment A" on their site, and another group was given "advertisement B." Both ads went to the same site, so it would stand to reason that each advertisement would render a similar "click to sales" ratio. Advertisement B pulled 523% better than advertisement A, and we verified that the results were indeed statistically significant. As you can see, context certainly matters.

Action:

Review all aspects of your site - the copywriting, the visual elements, the way in which material is organized - to ensure that your message has authority and credibility. Work with other websites that review products and services to gain positive linkages to your site that will result in receptive customers.

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8. Framing 57

Nixon's message hadn't changed. He was still essentially saying "I didn't do it." What changed was the way he framed this information, and that made all the difference.

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The "frame" in which information is presented greatly influences the way that information is per-ceived.

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8. Framing 5 9

Both pages link to the same site. Which case do you think would be more likely to generate sales? The contents of www.mindcontrolmarketing.com is the same in both cases… Does it matter that the patch leading to the site is different? An over the top example, but you get the point: "All clicks are not created equal."

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Uncertainty

We can't really know anything.

(I think that's true. At least, I've been told this by authorities who have certain knowledge about “knowing.” But who knows?)

This chapter is all about what we know about Internet marketing, and about anything else in life for that matter. And the bottom line is, in an absolute sense, we don't really know anything.

Stay with me here. The significance of these seemingly nonsensical statements will be clear in a moment.

Perhaps the following example will make things clear:

There's no such thing as absolute, unchanging knowledge.

Doctors said in the early 20th century that they "knew" that it was “physically impossible” for a human to run a mile in less than four minutes.

In the 1954 olympics, Roger Bannister set a new world-record and ran the mile in less than four minutes.

So, how then, did these doctors "know" it was "physically impossible" to run a mile in under four minutes?

Getting a headache yet? Who are we to trust?

Let's try to bring some clarity to our lack of “knowing.” In 1926, a physicist and one of the founders of quantum mechanics, Werner Heisenberg, developed an impor-tant theory about this concept.

(Whoa ... I see you running away to the next chapter just because I mentioned the

word "physics." Stop right there! I promise that we're not going to start discussing esoteric mathematical formulae. Let's get right to the bottom line in plain English.)

Heisenberg is probably best known for his "Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle." Simply put, the principle states that we can't be certain of anything because the very act of looking at something changes its nature.

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Get it? The minute we examine something, measure something, shine a light on something to get a better view of it, we're changing it through our interaction with it. It is impossible to "see" anything without changing it in some way (see the cartoons at the end of this chapter for a clear explanation of this phenomenon).

Heisenberg admits that, while his principle rules out absolute certainties, it does allow for probabilities. He said, "We may not be able to know the location of a particle, but you can have a good idea of where it might be."

You can have some fun with Heisenberg's principle. For example, at your next party, when someone is arguing with you and makes a forceful statement, you simply cross your arms and tell them, "You can't really know that, you know…" Then blow their minds with a quick explanation of Uncertainty.

Beyond that usage, though, what relevance does Heisenberg's theory have for you in your business life? More specifically, if we can't know anything, then what good does market testing do us?

The effectiveness of marketers can often by gauged by how well they understand what they don't know, and develop their strategies accordingly.

Most marketers fall into one of four basic categories:

1. Those who don't have a clue, but think they understand advertising and mar-keting because they've spent so much time on their couch watching TV.

2. Those who have read lots of books and have subscribed to the teachings of a marketing guru or two and, thus, feel that they know it all.

3. Those who realize that even the gurus are wrong sometimes, and can't know anything for themselves until they test it. (Most marketers get to this point, then stop testing things themselves, even though they keep giving lip service to the topic of test-ing.)

4. Those that realize that (holy shit!) even their own testing is uncertain at best. I know thousands of marketers. I'm on a first name basis with most of the best-

known "marketing gurus" alive today. Yet, I know very few who are at level four and can admit that they can never be absolutely certain about anything.

The fact is, Heisenberg aside, market testing can never be truly scientific because there are too many variables in play. No matter how rigorous you are, the outcome of your testing can be affected by factors you could never imagine, or never control.

That is why this chapter comes with an ironclad moral: Drawing broad conclusions

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9. Uncertainty

from your testing can be hazardous to your financial health.

In my own office, we talk a lot about marketing principles and about the lessons that have been passed down from all of the greats in the field, but we also spend time talking about "probabilities," "confidence intervals" and "predictions."

In other words, we are willing to admit that we never know anything for sure.

There are steps you can take, though, to improve your odds. I highly encourage you to spend some time learning, in at least a rudimentary sense, the science of statis-tics and apply it to your marketing. Studying the science of statistics gives you a sys-tematic way of dealing with your uncertainty.

At the end of the day, you can engage in all of the scientific testing and all of the statistical analysis you can possibly afford, but it still comes down to rolling the dice and making judgment calls. The key is to make those judgment calls as sound as you can by collecting and learning from statistical data.

I don't want this chapter to dissuade you from engaging in market testing. The great thing about Internet marketing is that market testing on the Internet is generally much cheaper than market testing offline. You can blow hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, offline only to find out that not a single one of your tests is giving you a positive Return on Investment.

By contrast, Internet marketing campaigns are cheap, sometimes even free. Think of the cost difference between sending out a direct mail piece and an e-mail.

Use your resources wisely, not falling into the trap of squandering excessive sums of money on a "sure thing."

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Concept:

Uncertainty. Nothing can ever be known for certain, because the very act of examining something changes the nature of the entity being examined.

Lesson:

Realize that your best efforts at market testing should not yield broad conclu-sions because you must always be wary of unknown factors.

Action:

Gather statistical data on your Internet marketing efforts. Use that data to develop probabilities and likely avenues of success, while maintaining the flex-ibility to change when unknown factors have unplanned effects on your mar-keting efforts.

It's highly appropriate to end our section on science by talking about uncer-tainty. As we delve into the next section, we're abandoning science altogether and going to war.

Before you judge the following section harshly with your newly-developed skeptical scientific eyes, remember that soldiers throughout history have fol-lowed the principles that I'm about to share with you.

And, armed with those principles, they have won.

They have stayed alive while watching their enemies die.

So, it stands to reason that we should pay close attention to doctrines that have meant life for those who have followed them, and death to those who have ignored them.

You're probably still asking yourselves, what the hell do wartime principles have to do with Internet marketing?

Well, maybe a little story about something called "Killer Junior" can answer that question for you....

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9. Uncertainty 6 5

Somebody's lying.

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We can't observe something without touching it in some way. Light has to hit an object first before we see it… So, Heisenberg says that we can never know the true, unchanged nature of any-thing, because our very act of observing changes what is observed. So, can we know anything at all?

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If uncertainty is the ultimate level of marketing education, what's the point?

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With hard stats as your foundation (uncertain at times as they may be), and the combination of your past experience and your acquired marketing knowledge to guide you, over time you will make better and better marketing decisions.

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P a r t T w o : W a r f a r e"Art can not only bring the end nearer to the means, but by giving a higher value to the means, enable the end to be extended."

- B. Liddel Hart

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Killer Junior

Sometimes all it takes is a minor shift in perception to allow men to remove their shackles of limitations and mediocrity, and enable the accomplishment of great

things.

Earlier in this book, we talked about herds and the Conformity to Group Norms. Understanding about the herd mentality is essential in knowing how to build your cus-tomer base.

This chapter has nothing to do with herds, though. Instead it has everything to do with what each of us can do as individuals to overcome our limitations and succeed, even when the odds are against us.

Before we get to that point, though, let's talk again about the two herds of kids who made up the majority of the youthful population of the United States in the 1960s.

In those years, one massive herd of young kids (some naïve, some patriotic) went off to a land they didn't know to die in a war they didn't understand. The U.S. govern-ment tried to dismiss this war as a police action, but the bottom line was still the deci-mation of a herd of good kids who did what their country asked them to do.

Another herd of young kids would have none of it. They stayed home, took drugs, protested the war, "tuned in, turned on and dropped out." The herd pretended to be individual anarchists, but while they were protesting the authority of the government, they were being influenced by the newer, even more powerful authority of television.

Let's focus on the herd that went off to fight a war. One of the activities essential to waging that war was called "defending a fire base."

U.S. Artillery units in Nam were arranged in "fire bases." These fire bases were great

for blowing things up at a distance. Their vulnerability, though, came when the enemy got too close (and getting close was, unfortunately, one of the Viet Cong's true talents). It's not a promising situation when you're surrounded by 20 highly-skilled killers and you have long-range howitzers at your disposal.

Thus, the flachette round was invented. This was a nasty little weapon. It's like a regular artillery round only, instead of firing a heap of shrapnel at someone far away, it shot razor-sharp needles directly at close range targets. This discouraged the Viet Cong for a short time.

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Unfortunately, though, the "enemy" - resourceful as they were - figured out that they could avoid the flachettes simply by ducking. We fire a round of flachettes, they duck, and we're still in a world of trouble.

One day, the brilliant commander (nicknamed "Junior") of a very effective artillery battalion (whose callsign was "Killer") got sick and tired of seeing his fire bases so greatly distracted by these attacks. He got particularly irritated upon learning that the Viet Cong were simply ducking under flachette rounds while they crawled even closer to his fire bases.

Junior was a resourceful guy. He could have waited for the Army to develop some new technology that would help him better defend his fire bases. But, a lot of boys would have died in the process.

People were dying today, so he needed a solution today.

Junior realized that he had, at his disposal, HE (stands for "high explosive") rounds that would send waves of deadly shrapnel at the enemy. These artillery rounds were set to blow up well off in the distance, but what if the fuse were set so that the HE round would blow up at a much closer range? That would solve the problem of the enemy ducking under the flachette rounds, as an HE round wreaked devastation in all directions. It was a stroke of genius, except for one problem. How do you set the rounds off close to the base without killing your own people? Junior's solution was brushed aside as impossible by many.

Junior sat down with a piece of paper and figured out a table of distances and fuse settings for a regular HE round that would: a) prevent the men firing the cannon from get-ting hit by shrapnel, and b) send out a withering, indefensible blast of shrapnel at close range Viet Cong targets.

The effect was immediate and devastating. Once the technique was perfected, all artillery units in the Army started implementing Junior's innovation and the job of defending a fire base became much easier. Viet Cong troops were much more hesitant to attack a fire base after this.

The performance of the U.S. Army Field Artillery in Vietnam was simply brilliant. Because of their unflinching responsiveness and seemingly unstoppable ability to adapt, the Viet Cong was never once able to overrun a U.S. firebase in the Vietnam War. The Field Artillery were so renowned for these impressive displays of defensive tactics, that when Infantry soldiers were reassigned to Field Artillery units, they would dance and shout out, "I'm going to live!"

Your business is your "fire base," and you need to defend it with the zeal of the U.S. Army Field Artillery.

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10. Killer Junior

I call "Killer Junior Solutions" cases in which people with limited resources solve problems

that others with far greater resources could not.)

The Internet world presents a case study in the value of "Killer Junior" solutions.

When the "dot com bubble burst" in 2000 and the market crashed, a good many people learned the painful lessons that problems cannot be solved simply by throwing heaps of money at them.

Too many people didn't realize the value of, and the need for, innovative solutions. Public companies are formed on the basis of private investors funding the growth of the public com-pany. This system is based on perception rather than actual performance. Therefore, public companies are not motivated to find innovative solutions to problems.

If you operate a small Internet business, you have every motivation in the world to find answers to stay alive.

Some prefer to take refuge in excuses, instead. They use their lack of resources as a rea-son for their failures - "Yeah, those other guys are doing well, but I could do it even better if I had their money ..."

We've learned at the outset of the 21st century that money is not, in and of itself, a solu-tion. We must find ways to excel despite our limitations.

Start looking for ways to accomplish your goals with the resources you have at hand.

Stop waiting.

Stop making excuses.

Stop planning for ways to explain failure; plan for success.

Thousands of American businesses have started with virtually nothing, but have gener-ated great masses of wealth through persistence and innovative thinking. You can do what these business successes have done.

My good friend Ted Nicholas, one of the best copywriters in the world, started his first business with only $79 in his pocket. Today he has two homes on two continents, is one of the most respected gentlemen in the world, and has generated hundreds of millions of dol-lars in sales.

Read the above paragraph again ...

And some people will tell you it’s impossible to start a business for less than $100,000.

The answer lies in having the desire to seek and develop your own "Killer Junior" solution.

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Concept:

Killer Junior. Success is directly tied to innovative thinking that overcomes seemingly insurmountable obstacles.

Lesson:

You must develop a success plan that doesn't rely strictly on financial resources. Your future must be based on innovation, rather than simply money.

Action:

Honestly assess your current situation. Determine the obstacles that stand in the way of your goals and objectives, and that threaten your future viability. Brainstorm avenues that can help you attract new customers and retain current ones without relying on infusions of cash.

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The Viet Cong soldiers quickly learned how to defend themselves from the flat-trajectory flachette rounds. Until…

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High Explosive rounds used in an innovative way solved the problem. Killer Junior doesn't care if you duck. It took "Killer Junior" thinking to come up with this solution.

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10. Killer Junior 7 7

"Famous Last Words"

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Heavy Ground

One way to win wars is to go undetected, deep into enemy territory, before launching your attack. You catch your enemy totally off guard and use that

element of surprise to gain crucial victory. Sun Tzu calls this ground deep in enemy territory "Heavy Ground."

As I explained earlier in the book, to understand how to win at business, it is tremendously advantageous to learn how armies win wars.

Asians have known this for centuries. We Westerners are increasingly getting the point.

Once you open your mind to the concept of business-as-warfare and begin to think metaphorically, you open a whole new world of promise and possibilities for yourself. Solutions that other people cannot fathom will become second nature for you. Your opponents will find you inscrutable.

Let's go back to Sun Tzu. He defines eight types of ground on which combat can occur. Of those, two are of great interest to those of us in marketing: Deadly Ground and Heavy Ground.

A Deadly Ground battle occurs when two forces meet and there is no escape route for either. You immediately realize the ramifications and consequences of such a battle. It becomes a pure fight-or-die battle, the ultimate win/lose scenario. Such a battle is one of brute force, and there can only be one winner. He with the most firepower will win, but it will likely be a "pyhrric victory" with heavy casual-ties.

Sun Tzu says, quite correctly, that this is the worst way to fight a battle. A Deadly Ground battle is one without “Art,” and allowing this to happen reflects badly on the commander.

Compare this to the Heavy Ground battle, in which you strive for surprise,

deception and strong advantage.

A Heavy Ground battle makes amazing things possible. It allows a weak force to paralyze a stronger force, simply by gaining a strategic advantage. Imagine a five-year-old girl with a sharp knife sneaking up behind Arnold Schwarzenegger.

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If Arnold does not see her coming, he becomes a casualty to a far smaller, weaker oppo-nent.

Let's shift the metaphors now to Internet marketing. Imagine a Deadly Ground battle, a fight to the death. You versus the consumers, whose resistance you hope to conquer. Who has the greatest strength in this fight - you or your potential customer?

Let's set up the battlefield scenario. You present your prospect with an ad. At that moment, you have your win/lose dynamic in place. Either you win by defeating your target's natural resistance and convincing him to respond to your ad, or he defeats you by ignoring you.

It's pretty clear who has the upper hand.

Ignoring your ad does the consumer no harm. In fact, he may even save a couple of bucks by not giving it any attention. The odds are against you at the outset because today's consumer has a very low tolerance for advertising. They've seen so many ads that even the most innovative, dynamic advertising piece does not generate a bit of excitement.

For the Internet marketer, this battleground is particularly daunting because your average Internet user is well-educated, making it a harder sell right from the get-go. Additionally, most people log on to the Internet not for commerce, but for information.

When the consumer has so much more power than the marketer, it is foolhardy to fight a Deadly Ground battle. You, the marketer, will lose virtually every time. You can fire your primary weapon - your advertising - but it's going to be ineffective because you cannot overcome your target's defenses. A battle fought on Deadly Ground will always go to the stronger army, all things being equal, and in the Internet marketing world, the consumer is always the stronger combatant.

How, then, do you win an advertising battle?

Think about how you lose a Deadly Ground battle. You lose in those first few sec-onds, when the consumer sees your advertising and immediately dismisses it as intru-sive junk.

If you were able to fight this battle on Heavy Ground rather than Deadly Ground, you might have a chance of winning. But how does one fight a marketing war on Heavy Ground? How does one gain that element of surprise?

Read on, my friend ...

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Concept:

Heavy Ground. A Deadly Ground battle is one in which one combatant must win and one must die, with the stronger combatant virtually always being the winner.

Lesson:

In a contest of wills between marketers and consumers, the consumer is always the stronger combatant. There is no downside to the consumer in dismissing advertising without giving it a moment's attention.

Action:

Review your own marketing campaigns in terms of your outreach to consumers. Are you fighting Deadly Ground battles in which you fire advertising at your tar-gets without seeking more effective ways to penetrate their defenses? If you're using your advertising artillery consistently without success, it's time to reas-sess your strategy.

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We use sports metaphors in our language every day. It's not much of a stretch to apply military metaphors in the same way…

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11. Heavy Ground 8 3

A heavy ground attack takes place deep inside enemy territory. Get in quietly and hit hard before they realize you’re there.

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So many direct marketing battles are fought on deadly ground…

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Deception

Success in both war and business hinges greatly on our ability to recognize "cues" in human behavior, and learning how to capitalize on that knowledge.

We learned in the last chapter that attempting to fight a Deadly Ground battle against your target consumer's natural anti-advertising defenses is a losing battle. You simply cannot make a consumer, whose every reflex is to toss a piece of adver-tising in the trash without giving it a serious look, alter their ingrained habits.

Fight this kind of war in the Internet economy, and you will lose.

Let's go back to the teachings of Sun Tzu and understand something impor-tant about human nature. Each of us have conditioned our minds to react certain ways when we see particular "cues" in the world around us. When a consumer sees printed material, for example, that looks like an advertising circular, they are "cued" to toss it in the trash.

When we, as marketers, learn what those cues are and understand how con-sumers react to them, we are all the stronger for it.

Sun Tzu said, "Warfare is the way of deception. Therefore, if able, appear unable. If active, appear non-active. If near, appear far. If far, appear near. Attack where they are not prepared, go out to where they do not expect."

These are vital teachings in marketing, just as they were crucial to the Viet Cong's success in Vietnam.

"Charlie" (the Viet Cong soldiers) used to drive good old "Joe" (the men wear-ing the U.S. uniforms) crazy by using Sun Tzu's tactics.

Late at night, just for good-hearted fun, Charlie would run out in front of Joe's fox holes to shake trees and raise a ruckus. This would wake Joe up and put him on alert. He'd have to remain that way for much of the night until he was certain Charlie wasn't there to kill him. Charlie would run away, laughing heartily about making Joe lose valuable sleep time.

Charlie would play this game several times a night for a few nights in a row, causing Joe's frustration and sleep-deprived anxiety to grow greater. Finally, after a few nights of this, Joe would throw in the towel and say to himself, "Ah, Charlie's

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just up to his old tricks. I'm going to get some shuteye."

Of course, when Joe finally surrendered his vigilance and decided to get a little sleep, ol' crazy Charlie would sneak in with a group of his friends and kill Joe in his sleep.

Quite a practical joker, ol' Charlie was. Ha ha. Good one.

Over time, we all become conditioned to react a certain way to particular cues. The North Vietnamese studied the way the U.S. soldiers reacted to particular cues, and then adapted their strategy accordingly.

The only way to succeed in the Internet marketplace is to do the same. Study the way a cynical consumer population acts and reacts, and then shape a strategy that will pen-etrate their skeptical defenses.

Let's talk about eZines (e-mailed newsletters). Anyone who has been online for any significant length of time has probably signed up for a few of these electronic publica-tions. Sadly, we come to find that the vast majority of these eZines are devoid of valuable content, and are simply a vehicle to pummel us with advertising. It doesn't take long to realize that there isn't any point in reading these.

We, as Internet consumers, equate eZines with junk. And junk acts as a cue for us to act in a particular way. When we go through our e-mail every day, we've become pretty adept at discerning which missives are wastes of time and which are worth reading. We keep our finger eagerly poised on the delete key to prune away the e-mail garbage, just saving the items worth our attention.

It's essential, as marketers, that we recognize this behavior and make it a component of our planning.

At my own office, I have trained my staff to recognize and remove any cues that will make our e-mail look like junk mail or content-free newsletters. This has improved our response rates dramatically. My company sends out several eZines. I make sure that they contain very few, or absolutely no, advertisements. I've found other ways of "monetizing" my newsletters so that I don't have to fill them with ads. (I use subtle product recommen-dations and so on - never blatant advertisements.)

If our newsletters are first viewed as a personal letter, this gets the recipient's attention. Eventually, though, they're going to realize that it's a newsletter that is also being received by several hundred other people. That's why we have to make sure that the newsletter is not viewed as an intrusion. These newsletters contain content that is so valuable that recipients find them a welcome arrival instead of a newsletter.

Also, we remind them that they subscribed to the newsletter and that it is not unsolic-ited junk.

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12. Deception

Every form of advertising, no matter how competently created, has a set of cues that blinks like a flashing warning light, signaling the consumer that it's an ad. These cues put marketers immediately on the defensive, and in a battle that is being fought on Deadly Ground.

The key here - and it is so vitally important - is to remove the cues from your adver-tisements, and keep your prospects from immediately putting up their defenses. If you can get your prospect to at least view your ad, even for a few seconds, with his defenses down, you've managed to get at least a little information into his consciousness (or a lot of information if you're really good), and you're fighting on Heavy Ground instead of Deadly Ground. At this point, the advantage has shifted to a degree in your direction.

When their defenses are down, your next objective is to communicate enough information to build both curiosity and credibility. If you can do that, your chances of closing the sale increase dramatically.

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Concept:

Deception. Deception is a key strategic concept in war and in advertising. Advertising contains cues that put buyers' defenses on alert. Consumers are conditioned to reject material they consider "junk."

Lesson:

In order to make an impact on prospects, it is essential to recognize and remove the cues that will cause automatic rejection of your advertising.

Key Term:

Cue - anything that cues in your prospects mind that they are being "pitched."

Note:

Please understand that what I am proposing here is quite different from "decep-tive advertising." I would never in any way misrepresent myself, my company, or any product or service. Ever. What I'm talking about is quite different. I'm refer-ring to using deception to play with a prospects perception and attention, in order to further a legitimate (and honest) sales process - not to convince them they're purchasing products they won't actually receive. There is a huge differ-ence here, and if you don't understand this, read this chapter again until you "get it."

Action:

Review your e-mails, your eZines, your advertising and all of the material you use to communicate with your prospects. Make a point of sending substantive material that will be of benefit to your prospects, and that will be seen as an asset to their lives instead of an intrusion. Focus on the ways in which you label your materials so they seem personal and not a form of anonymous mass adver-tising.

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12. Deception 8 9

At first, the soldiers were kept up late at night by the rattling of the trees. Each time they thought it was the sound of Charlie creeping up on them.

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After a while, they learned the game. They wouldn't let Charlie fool them anymore!

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Yep, ol' Charlie wouldn't fool them this time.

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Each of these emails cues off "spam."

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12. Deception 9 3

This one, however, cues off something different. It begs to be opened.

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Concentration

The principles of war, not merely one principle, can be condensed into one single word - 'concentration.' But for truth this needs to be amplified as 'the

concentration of strength against weakness.' And for any real value it needs to be explained that the concentration of strength against weakness depends on the dispersion of your opponent's strength, which in turn is produced by a distribu-tion of your own that gives the appearance and partial effect of dispersion. Your dispersion, his dispersion, your concentration - such is the sequence and each is a sequel. True concentration is the fruit of calculated dispersion."

- B. Liddel Hart

That is probably the greatest paragraph ever written about war.

And when I take the time right now to put it in context, you are going to come back to that paragraph, read it again, and be filled with an understanding of how you can apply these lessons in business to give yourself a decided strategic advan-tage.

First, let me go to the heart of what this paragraph means. In essence, Hart is saying that you must put a weakness on display for your opponent to see. When your opponent concentrates his resources to attack what he perceives as your weakness, he must then create weak spots of his own. Once he does that, you focus your strengths to attack his newly-created weaknesses and defeat him.

Make sense?

It made a lot of sense to the Union Army during the Battle of Gettysburg in the Civil War. We're not going to review the entirety of that 1863 battle, though. Instead, we're going to focus on smaller drama within the larger conflict. It was called Pickett's Charge, and it's one of the best historical examples of Hart's Theory at work.

At the climax of a protracted and bloody artillery battle, General Robert E. Lee was concerned. One of his top units, Pickett's division, had already suffered signifi-cant losses. They were running low on ammunition. But General Lee thought the Federals were running out of ammo as well.

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13Kick Your Opponent Where It Hurts - Right in His Dispersion

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What Lee didn't know was that the Federal artillery had made a calculated decision to show Lee a perceived weakness that they knew he would want to attack. The artil-lery stopped firing, giving Lee the impression that they were completely out of ammu-nition. Lee believed it was time to give Pickett's division the "go ahead" to charge into the center of the Federal lines and go for the kill.

This is the famous "Pickett's Charge." Pickett's men charged the Federal Center on open ground. The Confederates were shocked, to say the least, when the Federals opened fire with their artillery. Federal guns cut down most of Pickett's men - killing, wounding or capturing two-thirds of them.

This showed the beauty of Hart's theory of war - "your dispersion, his dispersion, your concentration - such is the sequence and each is a sequel." First, the Federal troops provide the appearance of being out of ammunition (your dispersion). Then, Pickett's men charge out into the open, without any artillery of their own to cover their movement (his dispersion). Then, the Federals make the kill by opening up their artil-lery on Pickett's exposed men (your concentration).

Now, let's apply this theory to your business. Remember that the purpose of this book is to enable you to experience a shift in perspective, to begin thinking about your business in a way that will give you a tremendous edge over your competition.

In that light, this chapter is critical in helping you transform potential failure into actual success.

Let us think, for the moment, of your competition as your "opponent." If your opponent is offering a product at a low price and bases his consumer appeals on price, it can be interpreted that his concentrating his power in that area - on price.

If you cannot effectively lower your price, does it make sense for you to compare the price of your product to the price of his? Of course not. Remember, the key to suc-cess is to put your concentration against your opponent's dispersion. In other words, match your strength versus his weakness.

There is no such thing as a perfect business. Every product, every business has a dispersion, a weakness. More accurately, every product and every business has numer-ous points of weakness. How can you define your opponent's weakness, and then pit your concentration against his dispersion?

Local gyms these days are having a tough time competing with the huge chains like Bally Total Fitness and 24 Hour Fitness. The big guys have obvious advantages. They can offer 24-hour service and a world-class facility. With a low budget, a local independent gym cannot compete against the big boys on price, equipment and hours. If they try, they'll be like the 98-pound weakling getting sand kicked in his face.

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13. Concentration

The big chains are so strong and, consequently, everybody goes there.

So, what's their weakness? What's their "dispersion?" Well, an analysis would prob-ably uncover many. One not-so-obvious one is the fact that everybody goes there.

Clever gym managers are charging more for their memberships - and developing a clientele - by touting a certain degree of exclusivity. "Sure," they say, "you can go to Bally's and get a cheap membership, but just try getting a chance to use the equip-ment! It's always overcrowded. With us, you're in an exclusive club and you don't have to wait in line to lift weights."

This approach works because it pits the concentration of the small gym (exclusivity, less crowding) against the dispersion of the big gyms (open to all, always crowded).

Let's make this even more interesting. What if you think of your customers as your "opponents." (Hey, I love customers. We're talking metaphors here.) If you win, you get to take some of the customer's money. If you lose, he keeps it and you get nothing.

It can be argued that the power of the Internet consumer is concentrated in his ability to find free information online. This is one of the greatest obstacles for people who sell information. If people get a sense they can find the same information for free, why pay for it?

Consumers have dispersions too, however. In this case, it's time. Yes, you can find almost any information for free online if you've got the time and the inclination to look hard enough. For today's busy consumers, though, they seldom have that kind of time available, and they don't want to use their spare minutes searching the web.

Want to succeed against your opponent, the consumer? As an info-seller, put your concentration (a large supply of readily-available, uncommon information) against the consumer's dispersion (lack of time). Point out this linkage and make it painfully obvi-ous to your consumer opponents that they can't live without the convenient access to information you're offering.

Like Pickett, they'll charge right into your midst, waving their credit cards in your direction.

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Concept:

Concentration. Battles are won when you successfully pit your strengths against your opponents' weaknesses.

Lesson:

In determining your selling points, assess the weaknesses of your competition and promote those strengths that lie in direct contrast. Likewise, assess the greatest needs (or weaknesses) of your prospects and tailor your marketing to attack them.

Action:

Conduct an in-depth study of your competitors. What are their weaknesses? High prices? Lack of selection? Lack of convenience? Overcrowding? Make a list of their vulnerabilities and then develop a corresponding list of your busi-ness's strengths. Write ad copy that communicates the contrast.

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13. Concentration 9 9

The Federals stopped firing and this gave General Lee the impression that they were out of ammu-nition, when in fact, they had abundant ammunition left. Then… Pickett's charge. Remember: "Your dispersion, his dispersion, your concentration."

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Concentrate on the dispersion, not on the concentration. Attacking a company with low prices by lowering your own is attacking a strong point. Attacking their quality, if it's lacking, is an appropri-ate attack on a week point.

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The consumer always has a great dispersion of time. He doesn't want to spend his whole life look-ing around. Pit your concentration (an instantly deliverable solution to his problem) against his dispersion in this way.

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Factors of Recognition

In both war and business, there is an extraordinary amount of attention devoted to the matter of being seen. There are good reasons for that. In war, being seen

can get you killed. In business, being seen is essential to maintain your economic life.

Visibility, whether in warfare or the marketplace, is a science. Millions of dol-lars have been spent and years of psychological research conducted to understand how to be (and not be) seen.

According to U.S. Army Field Manual 20-3, there are seven "factors of recogni-tion." For the soldier, it's critical to memorize these items, because they are the fac-tors that will get you spotted by the enemy. They include:

Reflectance: FM 20-3 says, "Reflectance is the amount of energy returned from a target's surface as compared to the energy striking the surface." Or, to put it in layman's terms, if a soldier has anything that reflects light, it will catch the enemy's eye and trouble will be on the way.

Shape: Imagine a desert horizon. You gaze across the sand dunes, looking in outline like softly rounded ocean waves, and suddenly you see a large boxy vehicle sticking out among them. Because the shape does not blend into the environ-ment, the vehicle is spotted immediately.

Shadow: FM 20-3 says there are two types of shadows - a cast shadow, which is a silhouette of an object projected against its background, and a contained shad-ow, which is the dark pool that forms in a permanently shaded area. For a soldier, both of these are not good things.

Movement: FM 20-3 says, "Movement always attracts attention against a sta-tionary background. Slow, regular movement is usually less obvious than fast, erratic movement." In non-military language, that means don't move...and, if you do, do it slowly.

Noise: It doesn't take a doctorate degree to understand this one. We've all seen movie scenes in which a soldier walking quietly through a forest accidentally steps on and breaks a twig. Mayhem and carnage inevitably result.

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Texture: FM 20-3 says, "A rough surface appears darker than a smooth surface, even if both surfaces are the same color. For example, vehicle tracks change the texture of the ground by leaving clearly visible track marks." Irregular variations in color or shades of color produce this same effect. It's one of the reasons soldiers wear camouflage face paint in combat.

Patterns: Among a random natural setting, a rigid orderly pattern will stick out. A group of vehicles lined up nicely is much easier to spot because of the pattern it cre-ates. In other words, even if vehicles are covered in camouflage nets, if you leave them sitting in a nice, orderly row, some smart enemy soldier is going to figure out that God doesn't usually line up dirt mounds that way.

In marketing, we should take the admonitions of FM 20-3 and put them in reverse. We want to avoid being hidden. To stay incognito may be life for soldiers, but it's death for marketing. If you're invisible, it doesn't matter what other great marketing tech-niques you have up your sleeve because all is lost.

That's why, in the classic ad copy formula AIDA (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action), Attention always comes first. Getting and keeping the customer's attention must come first, and all else follows.

I'm going to offer some proven ways in which you can exploit the principles of rec-ognition to get the attention of your prospects. Keep something important in mind, though. These tips are like a very nice cologne. A little goes a long way. Dump a few tablespoons all over yourself, and you'll find that you're turning off far more people than you're attracting.

Too many marketers go over the top with their attention-getting schemes, gaining their prospects' attention, but losing any shred of credibility in the process. Bombard your prospects with too many of these tips too often, and their resulting sensory over-load will cause them to tune you out.

Used sparingly, though, these items can place and keep you prominently in your future customer's awareness.

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Concept:

Factors of Recognition. There are definite techniques that can grab and hold your prospects' attention.

Lesson:

Attracting attention to your products and services is all-important to building a clientele. Selective and sensible use of attention-getting techniques can set your selling materials apart from your competitors. Action:

Try incorporating the suggestions included in this chapter to improve the look of your website and sales materials. Also, rather than simply use these exam-ples, make a list of other creative ways to apply this concept - the utilization of recognition factors - to your marketing.

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Here, we exploit the principles of shape and texture to get our readers’ attention. Once we have their attention, we immediately use the psychological principle of "Obedience to Authority" in order to influence the buying decision of our prospects. Using these principles in combination like this can be quite powerful!

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A banner ad in the standard position as you see above is a very bad idea. It takes you maybe a sin-gle day on the Net to figure out "where the ads are." What happens then? You start tuning them out. Personally, even though I love looking at marketing, I scroll past the banner on a web page to get it totally out of my mind. This is now an unconscious and automatic act. If your prospects aren't scrolling past these banners physically, they are doing so mentally.

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In this unusual position, the banner is much harder to ignore. It's out of the ordinary, so the brain cannot immediately tune it out as it can the banner in the expected position. Can you think of some other tricky ways to get a banner ad seen? Think outside of the box.

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Among a motionless web page, a small piece of animation will easily grab the attention of your visitor. In this case here, the little arrow animates by fading in and out of view, creating a sense of motion.

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Conversely, on a web page that has animation at every corner, animation does not stand out at all. Motion is only a factor of recognition when it is found among stillness.

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Your reader has to start reading your salesletter before he can read the whole thing, of course. The problem is, the reader sometimes needs an extra nudge here and there to push him along that path.

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Headlines should be positioned on a page as you see above - above the main text in a larger type - uncluttered by anything else. One could provide many psychological and psychobiological reasons why the eye falls here first. None of that matters for our purposes. What matters is that it works. Capitalize on this position by a) getting your most important benefit out there in your first shot, b) capturing the curiosity of your reader, and c) addressing what is likely to be on the mind of your prospect.

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Continuous Operation

As our challenges get more and more demanding, how do we keep ourselves equipped for the task? This is a critical question in an era when business never

stops.

Life in the military teaches important lessons about how to keep yourself ener-gized for the tasks at hand.

When I was given my first taste of real "tactical" life in the Army, I learned a very important lesson from a seasoned soldier with whom I served. Our first night out on a long field operation, this soldier told me there were two different types of soldiers - "garrison soldiers" and "field soldiers."

Some soldiers performed quite well in a garrison environment - meaning back home in the barracks with showers and hot meals - but when they were out in the field, they broke down and ceased to function. Or, as this soldier said, "Put him out in the field and he'll go from man to bitch in half a day."

Of course, there were plenty of things about field life that could get to you - the dirt, the lack of showers or latrines, the horrible food, the lack of sleep. It was difficult to keep your energy levels high, and energy levels are a matter of critical importance in the military.

In the Army Field Manual 22-11 (Military Leadership), it is said that the tempo of modern warfare is increasing drastically and that our ability to sustain "continu-ous operations" is vital. Many officers thought that this meant soldiers should be trained to operate with less sleep, but Army research has indicated that sleep is a "combat multiplier."

That is, getting more sleep allows the soldier to get a much greater amount of work done in a shorter amount of time. If the same soldier is forced to work longer with less sleep, he will get less work done than his counterpart working shorter hours and getting more rest.

In other words, happy, rested and well-fed soldiers fight better. Period.

Similarly, the tempo of e-business is break-neck, and it's getting faster rather than slowing down. Jay Conrad Levinson, when first working with my company

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on an Internet publishing deal said, "I had no idea you guys could do things so quickly. You inspired me to coin a new term, 'Internet Time.' That's the new pace of business and those who can't keep up are clearly going to fail.”

Jay discovered a fact of life in Internet marketing. Online business happens light-ing-fast. Given a complete manuscript, my company, when publishing an electronic book, can crank out a world-class piece of work in as little as a week. It takes over a year for most print books to be published!

To prepare yourself for this pace, it does us all well to keep the military's advice in mind. Take care of yourself. Get more rest. Work fewer hours, and the hours you do work will be more productive.

For our office to function well on "Internet Time." overtime is strictly forbidden except in a case of extreme crisis.

This advice may not seem important to you now, but when you need it - and there is no question you will - it will save your life.

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Concept:

Continuous Operations. People function more effectively when well-rested, well taken-care-of, well-fed, and fit.

Lesson:

In the fast-paced world of Internet marketing, being competitive means keep-ing yourself in top shape and your energy levels continuously high.

Action:

Discipline yourself to stick to a strict schedule, limiting your work hours and giv-ing yourself ample rest on nights and weekends. Monitor your performance output and document to yourself that your production remains high, or even higher, when you give yourself ample rest.

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Sometimes the soldiers that excel in garrison life are not the same soldiers that excel in the field.

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Soldiers that are well rested and are treated well, get more work done in less time. "Continuous Operations" can wear you down fast if you don't take care of your basic needs first.

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Quick Victories

It’s not always wise to fight every battle that comes your way.

Sun Tzu said it best, "When doing battle, seek a quick victory. A protracted battle will blunt weapons and dampen ardor."

We can learn important lessons today from the life of the Greek leader Pyrrhus, who led successful conflicts against Rome in 280 and 279 B.C. In 280, Pyrrhus utterly defeated a Roman Army in Heraclea, and did the same a year later at Ausculum.

The problem for Pyrrhus, though, was that the two bitter and protracted battles - as impressive as they may have been - left him with heavy casualties and a severely weakened army. From this bit of history, we get the term "pyrhhic vic-tory," meaning "a victory that comes at great cost."

What is gained by winning if you suffer losses that leave you unable to fight the rest of the war?

Pyrrhus should have listened to Sun Tzu, who wrote, "If troops lay siege to a walled city, their strength will be exhausted. If the army is exposed to a prolonged campaign, the nation's resources will not suffice. When weapons are blunted and ardor dampened, strength exhausted and resources depleted, the neighboring rul-ers will take advantage of these complications. Then even the wisest of counsels would not be able to avert the consequences that must ensue."

In business, we must all ask ourselves if we are falling into the trap of trying to lay siege to walled cities - fighting battles that will sap our essential resources.

In Internet marketing, we often find ourselves trying to take on a walled city or two. Take search engines, for example.

Yes, search engines can be a great source of targeted traffic for your website. The problem is, many small businesses get greedy and think, erroneously and to their detriment, that spending a great deal of time on search engine positioning will open the doors to enormous success

They employ a great many innovative techniques to gain a high placement in

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the various search engines. Sometimes they are successful. Usually, though, in the long run, it ends up not being worth the time they invest. Let me give you a few reasons why this is the case:

> Search engines are constantly changing the rules - their ranking algorithms - all the time. What gives you a number one ranking today may leave you in 4000th posi-tion tomorrow. All of your hard work may suddenly be for nothing.

> Submit the same content too many times, or do it too often, and the search engines may ban you. Again, your hard work may go straight down the drain.

> Getting that number one ranking probably won't deliver the flood of traffic you imagine it will. Hard work, again, squandered.

> There are many other, far simpler Internet marketing tasks that will render a greater return-on-investment with far less effort.

Now, I've got nothing against search engines. In fact, I wrote one of the first books on search engine promotion, and I've created two search engines myself, so I know a little about the topic.

There are a few people out there who have truly mastered the art of search engine positioning. They do very well with it. They are also very rare. (If you are one of these people, feel free to ignore this point.)

Most people, though, spend hours and hours fighting the search engine wars only to see their efforts bearing little, if any fruit.

Now, if you walk away from this chapter with this knowledge about search engine promotions alone, this book will have paid for itself. The larger point I want to commu-nicate, though, is the concept of a quick victory.

I've known too many people who have regretted their choices to eschew the quick victories that were handed to them.

A friend of mine was once offered $100,000 for his website. At first, he was ecstatic about the deal. He had never envisioned having $100,000 and this money would make a profound change in his life. Then, though, he heard the story of someone else selling a similar site for $1,000,000 and it angered him. He went back to the buyer and told them he wanted more.

This led to a long and fruitless negotiation process that screwed up the whole deal.

He walked away having wasted months of time in negotiations, and without a single dollar in his pocket.

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16. Quick Victories

Had he simply taken the quick victory that was laying on his doorstep, he would have been $100,000 richer. Yes, $100,000 doesn't compare to a cool million, but it's a hell of a lot better than zero (not even factoring in the wasted time).

Extend this concept, or any of the concepts in this book for that matter, and see how they can be applied in other ways.

Have you fought a protracted legal battle that left you with nothing? Have you been working on that "one big project" that never seems to come to fruition? Are you married to a promotion concept that just isn't working?

Are you spending hours upon hours trying to move up the search engine ladder with nothing to show for it?

Seek the quick victories and move forward, my friend.

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Concept:

Quick Victories. People and armies lose wars by fighting difficult, prolonged battles that leave their resources depleted.

Lesson:

Avoid engaging in tasks, projects and conflicts that have the potential of con-suming large amounts of time and resources without necessarily yielding sub-stantial gain.

Action:

Evaluate your ongoing business actions. Ask yourself if you are spending inor-dinate amounts of time on affairs that have not yet produced significant ben-efits for you and your business. Give higher priority to those victories that can be won quickly, so that you can move on to other important matters.

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16. Quick Victories 1 2 3

If only Pyrrhus knew he would unwittingly coin a phrase. A “Pyrrhic Victory” is one in which you win, but at a great cost.

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Sound like anyone you know?

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16. Quick Victories 1 2 5

Sometimes it pays to drag things out for a better result. Usually, though, it pays just to accept a quick and sure victory that consumes fewer resources (time, money, emotional stamina).

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Boldness and Taking Risks

History has taught us that more battles have been won by bold moves than by the blunt flexing of brute force. By bold, I mean daring, fearless, gutsy actions

to take what you need.

Boldness is a concept you must “feel” to the depth of your bones.

When you think about boldness, let your mind turn to one of the greatest moments in the history of war - D-Day. Most know D-Day as an invasion that turned the tides of the European Theatre in World War II for the Allies, but not much more than that.

D-Day was one of history's great examples of balls and brilliance at work.

Let's set the scene. The Normandy beaches the Allies invaded on D-Day were probably some of the most treacherous military fortifications in history. The water leading up to the beaches was thoroughly mined. The beaches were mined, as well. The ground was covered with row after row of wire, and the beach ground was easily accessible by German machine guns positioned safely away in the hills above.

Suffice it to say that the landings themselves were a living hell (the movie “Saving Private Ryan” gave us a small taste of what this day was like, but keep in mind that the beaches stormed by those brave soldiers that day stretched over 50 miles.)

Finally, what makes this truly one of the greatest examples of boldness in his-tory is a little-known deception code-named "Bodyguard." This was a five-fold plan to confuse the Germans about the allies' true plans for re-capturing France. Four of the deception plans were devised to make the Germans think that D-Day would not happen on the Western shores of France at all.

The fifth and most important deception, code named “Fortitude South,” was devised to let the Germans think that the Allies would indeed invade France's Western shores, but that the invasion would happen at the Pas de Calais rather than at Normandy.

The execution of this deception was brilliant. The Allies ran false convoys,

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broadcast false radio transmissions and even set up a decoy tank division in Dover, England. To add the coup de grace, they even sent the real-life General Patton to Dover to "command" the decoy division.

This plan worked so well that Hitler concentrated most of his troops in the Pas de

Calais. This made a huge difference in what happened that day. If Hitler's forces had been concentrated in Normandy, one wonders whether or not the landing would have succeeded. Instead of being a great triumph for the allies, we may have seen images of bodies strewn over 50 miles of European beach in the biggest military debacle ever.

In the Korean War, we saw another great example of boldness by General Douglas MacArthur. By the time the brunt of the U.S. forces arrived in Korea after the invasion from the North, all of the existing South Korean and U.S. forces there were trapped in the "Pusan Perimeter." This was a small piece of land surrounding the beautiful port city of Pusan. North Korean leader Kim Il Sung expected MacArthur to concentrate his forc-es in Pusan and try to break out of the perimeter. This seemed the only sane action to take and, realizing that, Kim Il Sung intelligently concentrated most of his forces around Pusan.

No one ever accused MacArthur of being predictable, though. Instead of doing the expected, he took a sizable chunk of his forces up to Inchon, a small city just south of Seoul. No one would have expected this attack as the geography of the beach makes for an incredibly difficult landing operation.

This took the North Koreans by complete surprise. MacArthur was able to quickly capture Seoul, and cut the North Korean forces in two.

Why can't we, in business, act as boldly as great figures in history? Why can't we capture customers the same way that MacArthur and the Allies captured land?

The answer is, we can - if we're willing to be fearless in our actions. As B. Liddel Hart said, "...in war, the chief incalculable is the human will."

It's sad to say that most great business ideas are defeated before they are even written down. Of the billions of ideas that are tossed around our collective heads each day, the vast majority of them are quickly squelched by our cautious inner voices. Even those that get scribbled out on a legal pad seldom make it into the actual planning stages.

Yes, it's true that most attempted business ventures have but a slim chance of suc-ceeding. But without even an effort, slim becomes zero.

And when we're not squashing our own good ideas, we're too acquiescent in let-ting others squash them for us. I know many business owners who allow their ideas to be steamrolled by the ever-present bureaucracy before they even see the light of day.

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17. Boldness and Taking Risks

These entrepreneurs spend more time thinking about how many regulations they have to satisfy than they spend thinking about marketing.

I know one businessman who, on the basis of one phone call to a minor city bureaucrat, stopped work on a project he had been planning for six months. The man told my friend what he was doing was illegal, so my friend, dutiful citizen that he is, wanted to abide by the law. As it turned out, the bureaucrat had given him incorrect information! What he was doing was actually not illegal at all.

I learned a great deal in the Army about how to act boldly, living by the phrase,

"Forgiveness comes much easier than permission." I learned that it was better not to ask if something I planned was OK. It made more sense just to do it. If I broke the rules, I'd leave it to those in charge to enforce those regulations as they saw fit. Yes, I could be difficult to work with, but I was able to get a lot more done than if I had sat around waiting for permission to act.

Within reason, I try to run my business the same way. As long as I am operating ethically, why should I wait for the interpretations of bureaucrats before taking criti-cally-important actions?

Similarly, many people squelch their own plans before they come to fruition. They imagine ways that they will fail, so they decide not to try at all.

Microsoft’s success hinges upon one very bold request made by Bill Gates. When he was striking a deal with IBM to include his DOS software on every PC they shipped, he asked for one little thing that catalyzed his success. He asked for the exclusive rights to sell upgrades to his software. Most people would not have even asked, thinking that surely IBM saw the revenue potential of the software industry.

As we all know now, IBM in fact said, “yes.” IBM was convinced that the real money in computing would come from hardware sales. This single bold request is probably the most important event that made Bill Gates the richest man in the world.

Stop spending your time and energy worrying constantly about the rules. Stop car-ing about what other people think. Stop thinking about the ways your plans will fail.

Basil King probably said it best: “Be bold and mighty forces will come to your aid.”

You are competing on the Internet, one of the last great, largely-unrestricted fron-tiers. It will be virtually impossible for the world's governments to tame something so large, so far-flung, so free-wheeling as the Net. Take advantage of this freedom, because you won't find it in other venues. You have a license to act boldly. Act ethi-cally, treat people fairly, but for God's sake, stand up and take your share!

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Concept:

Boldness and taking risks. History has shown consistently that great victories are won by those willing to act boldly and shun self-doubts and the doubts of others.

Lesson:

Most people are not bold, so bold actions are rarely expected by your oppo-nent. This gives those who are willing to be bold a great advantage. The prob-lem is, we tend to "squelch" the bold ideas that pass through our minds. Your success in business is tied to your willingness to act boldly and fearlessly. "Be bold and mighty force will come to your aid.”

Action:

What are the boldest, most exciting Internet marketing plans that have ever crossed your mind? Write them down. Flesh them out. Begin figuring out how they might be carried out. In your planning, never, never, never allow the word "can't" to be an obstacle to what you want to achieve.

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17. Boldness and Taking Risks 1 3 1

D-Day was far more complex than most remember. An extremely bold deception effectively led the Germans to believe that the Allies would attack at the Pas de Calais - not Normandy.

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The Inchon Landing was perhaps MacArthur's greatest act of boldness.

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17. Boldness and Taking Risks 1 3 3

If you could tune into the thoughts of the people of the world like a radio station, you would not be able to bear the din of marvelous ideas thundering through the air. It's a staggering paradox that the greatest achievements of man all start as a single idea from one man - and that the poten-tial great achievements that men let slip through their mind outnumber them by a trillion to one.

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He heard wrong.

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"Don't Never Take a Chance You Don't Have To" (from the Ranger Handbook)

Seems kind of odd, doesn't it, that I would follow a chapter about acting boldly with a separate chapter about avoiding stupid risks?

It makes perfect sense, though. Soldiers win battles by being bold, but they stay alive by avoiding stupid risks.

You must be bold in order to achieve the dreams that are possible over the Internet. That doesn't mean, though, that you should foolishly squander your time and money.

Ironically, the Internet allows you to be bold and sensible at the same time. In the pre-Internet days, engaging in market testing meant, by necessity, that you had to risk large sums of money running ads.

If you are a smart player in the Internet economy, you realize that you don't have to risk your cash reserves in order to move toward your goals.

Refer back to the previous chapter. Attacking a target unexpectedly - even at great risk - well, that's bold. Doing it without taking all available precautions? That's just plain stupid.

Roger's Rangers - the British Colonial precursor to today's elite Ranger Regiment of the U.S. Army - knew how to defeat an enemy without taking foolish, dangerous risks.

During the French and Indian War, ground troops, for the most part, still fought in formations. They lined up like the little toy soldiers on a young boy's bedroom shelf - standing straight up and in perfectly-formed lines. To fight any other way was considered uncivilized by the armies of aristocratic countries like France and England. They believed you should stand up and face your opponent bravely - sticking out chins and chests.

Captain Robert Rogers, however, thought that being alive was a little more important than putting on a brave front.

He trained his men to fight by conducting ambushes and precision stealth strikes, minimizing their exposure and, thus, their risk. He saw how successful the

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18"Bold" and "Stupid" are Not Synonyms

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Indians had been in utilizing that style of fighting, and quickly realized that to fight any other way would be nothing short of suicide.

It took quite some time for the rest of the world to catch up and convert to guerrilla warfare tactics. Even as late as the Civil War, U.S. troops were still fighting in line forma-tions. Eventually, though, everyone saw the sense of choosing "alive" over "brave."

Businesses too often, act boldly without tempering those actions with forethought. They throw obscene amounts of dollars away on advertising without knowing if they are gaining anything positive from their investment. Some wise entrepreneurs (like Jay Conrad Levinson) know how to employ Guerrilla Marketing tactics in advertising and can do so quite cheaply. Most business people, though, don't have the creativity required to pull this off well.

You need to realize that the Internet is full of incredible advertising opportunities - many of them low cost, some of them even free of charge - if you just take the time to look for them. It's amazing to me how many companies are still, even years after the Internet burst onto the scene, spending hundreds of thousands, even millions, of dollars on ad campaigns without even trying a low-cost form of advertising on the Internet.

For many years, my company's advertising budget was ZERO. That's right. We didn't spend a dime on advertising.

Even today, I spend next to nothing on advertising and focus all of my efforts on maximizing what I can get for free. If I can send out an e-mail newsletter to hundreds of thousands of people for free, why not focus on maximizing that return instead of risking megabucks on expensive direct mail campaigns?

Once you discover the marketing and advertising resources available to you on the Internet, you'll be able to make other marketers - particularly those who are pre-Internet veterans - drool with envy.

You can declare freedom from the perceived high cost of doing business.

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18. "Don't Never Take a Chance You Don't Have To" 1 3 7

Concept:

Avoid unnecessary risks. It's essential to be bold in your actions, but it's just as important to be smart. Taking stupid risks is never a wise strategy.

Lesson:

You can be an aggressive and effective Internet marketer without squandering your resources on costly advertising and direct mail campaigns.

Action:

Make the time to scour the Internet for free and low-cost services that can help you gain visibility for your business. Develop as many of these resources as you can and put them to use. Evaluate your status in a month to determine if you have gained as much, if not more, through this low-budget approach than you would have by spending thousands of dollars on advertising and direct mail.

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Bravery or idiocy?

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18. "Don't Never Take a Chance You Don't Have To" 1 3 9

What was first seen as a cowardly way to fight has formed the foundation for the way we fight today. After all, there is nothing brave about standing up in front of a weapon to take a bullet. That’s just stupid.

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"Don't Ever March Home the Same Way. Take a Different Route So We Won't Be Ambushed."

(Ranger Handbook)

Some people absolutely need consistency and predictability. They need a life without surprise or variation.

Those people are not soldiers.

Nor are they successful business leaders.

In warfare and business alike, predictability simply means that the enemy has a better opportunity to ambush you and kill you. To keep breathing, you must be inscrutable and unpredictable. You must find new ways to engage your customers. You must be innova-tive in disguising your sales effort, keeping your competitors off-balance and keeping your prospects' interest.

If your rivals know what you are going to do, they are going to be prepared for you. If they don't have a clue what you'll do next, your chances of survival have increased expo-nentially. In fact, the more unpredictable you are, the more agitated your opponent will become, and he'll spend more time trying to predict your next move than working on his own.

Roger's Rangers, the fellows who broke tradition and began utilizing guerrilla fighting tactics also believed firmly in the concept of unpredictability. Whenever they went out on patrol, they automatically assumed that their enemies would be observing their move-ments and would plan future strategies based on that knowledge.

The Rangers knew that predictability begged for an ambush. Therefore, they would take a different route every time, giving their enemies nothing that could be used to plot a sneak attack. This made Roger's Rangers an even more formidable fighting force.

U.S. Army Anti-Terrorist Training teaches soldiers to have unpredictable habits. Since U.S. soldiers are prime targets for terrorism, this information saves their lives. Once a ter-rorist begins plotting an attack on a human target, his first step is to map his target's daily habits and figure out how to exploit them.

Even in sports, we see the value of being inconsistent. If a football team calls a run-ning play up the middle every single time they are in a first down situation, it's not going to take long for the opposing coach to recognize that tendency and stack extra defenders on the line of scrimmage to throw that runner for a loss. Winning football coaches vary their play selection to avoid giving their opponents tendencies to plan against.

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In business, your competitors are right now trying to think of ways to exploit your weak-

nesses. And if your behavior patterns are consistent and predictable, you are going to be ambushed. Sooner or later, it's going to happen. And it's going to hurt.

Let's say, for example, that you are an offline entrepreneur, selling widgets. Every Sunday, without fail, you have an "all widgets are 10% off - Sunday only" sale. You advertise this, week after week, in the Saturday and Sunday editions of the local paper. This campaign may not be a dynamo, but it's been working reasonably well for you, and quite frankly, you're too lazy to change it and try something new.

Your competitor decides to take advantage of your predictability and, one fateful Sunday, you open the newspaper to see an ad - bigger and better-looking than yours - tell-ing readers that "all widgets are 20 percent off - Sunday only."

Your sales have just flatlined for that weekend. Your competitor knew exactly what you would be doing that weekend and he ambushed you.

You try to bounce back the next weekend by cutting your prices even further but, by this point, your enemy has your number. He knows you are lazy and simple-minded in your approach to marketing, so he predicts your price reduction and runs an ad saying, "You can pay lower prices for lower quality widgets, or for just a few more dollars, you can invest in a widget that will last you a lifetime."

An over-reliance on consistency has been the death of countless unimaginative, innova-tion-free businesses. Predictability will hurt your relationship with customers, too. When they see marketing approaches that are never changing, they will simply tune you out.

Remember that a certain amount of variation is essential to keep your site visitors, your customers and your prospects interested.

This is especially important in ads that exploit the Ziegarnik Effect. Remember the "punch the monkey" banner ads that appeared so ubiquitously on the Internet in 1999? They were fun, weren't they?

The fun also wore off pretty quickly, didn't it?

The problems with those ads were that they didn't brand the companies using them, and they lost their novelty after the first couple of clicks. You'll notice that you don't see these ads appearing much any more … The funny thing about advertising is that ineffective advertising tends to disappear - either because an on-the-ball marketing analyst discovers it's no longer effective, or the companies paying for them go broke.

No matter how great your initial idea, if you fall into a rut with it, your opponent is going to take advantage. And you're going to pay a price for your consistency.

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19. "Don't Ever March Home the Same Way. Take a... 1 4 3

Concept:

Be unpredictable. Consistency and predictability enables your enemy to predict your actions, ambush you and defeat you.

Lesson:

If your marketing and sales techniques lack imagination and are entirely pre-dictable, you will find it impossible to maintain the interest of your customers and your opponents will find ways to ambush and undercut you. You must be unpredictable in order to thrive.

Action:

Make a concerted effort to insert variety into your marketing efforts. Step back and review your current activities. Look at your own business through your opponent's eyes. Try to see areas where you are too consistent, too predictable. Make a list of ways in which you can be more innovative in your approaches.

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“Don't never take the same road home twice.”

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19. "Don't Ever March Home the Same Way. Take a... 1 4 5

Predictability begs for an ambush.

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Because Acme always runs this same ad, Super Widgets Inc. ambushes him quite easily with a larger ad with a greater benefit.

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19. "Don't Ever March Home the Same Way. Take a... 1 47

Concentrating on teh weakness you created through deception...

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The Fox and the Rabbit

Many martial arts experts pass around this story. I don't know where it origi-nated, but I do know that it is extraordinarily relevant to what we do.

A Zen Master is out in the woods with his student. Out of nowhere jumps a rabbit scurrying furiously. A fox follows behind him, obviously wanting the rabbit to be his next meal.

They watch the chase for a few moments and the Zen Master asks the student, "Who will win?" The student answers quickly without thinking, "Well, of course, it's the fox. He is stronger and faster."

The Zen Master remains silent for a few moments to add emphasis to what he is about to say. "No," he replies, "the rabbit will get away." The student is puzzled, "I don't understand, master."

"The fox," replies the Zen Master, "is chasing the rabbit for a meal. The rabbit is running for his life."

Motivation is an irreplaceable key to success. The Vietnam War is a great lesson in this regard. One may argue that the reason the U.S. lost the war was because our soldiers were not fighting for their homes. They were fighting because they were told to. Their hearts were not in the battle.

Some may say it was the lack of congressional support or a host of other factors that lost the war, but the bottom line is that, man for man, the North Vietnamese outfought us. Beyond all of the politics and the espionage, they were indeed fiercer on the ground. (No disrespect at all meant to the American men who fought and died in that war. One wonders how they would have done had the country been on their side.)

The more desperate the opponent, the fiercer the fight. The U.S. soldiers were simply trying to stay alive until their tour of duty was over and they could go back home. The North Vietnamese were fighting to keep their country from being con-trolled by foreigners and to protect themselves from likely execution.

That's one hell of a difference in motivation.

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That motivational gap made itself clear in our business, as well, when the dot com bubble burst in 2000. Many well-funded companies went under. When the lifeblood of investment capital started flowing in, they couldn't survive.

It was strange to many, though, that a lot of the small "mom-and-pop" Internet operations were relatively unaffected by the crash.

It wasn't hard for me to see the reason why.

The people behind the dot com failures gained their fortunes without breaking much of a sweat. Many of them cashed in enough to gain a significant amount of per-sonal wealth well before the market crashed. If their company failed, it was no big deal. It wouldn't keep the gourmet dinner off the table.

They were the foxes. They were just running for another meal.

The mom-and-pop operations had much more to lose. They had quit their day jobs and dedicated hours upon hours to businesses that had become their dreams and their entire futures. If they failed, they would not only lose their hard-fought freedom as Internet entrepreneurs, but also the countless hours they had dedicated to their busi-nesses.

They were the rabbits, running for their lives.

Some of the greatest business success stories in history started as small (and des-perate) one-man operations, but grew to monumental successes.

My friend Ted Nicholas is the definitive example of the rabbit. He started out broke, frustrated, unemployed and demoralized. But, because he fought like a rabbit for his life, he is now retired with millions of dollars, splitting time between his homes in Switzerland and Florida.

What about you? Are you satisfied with what you have, complacent about your sta-tus? Are you simply chasing another meal? Are you a fox?

I say that your future lies in being the rabbit. Use all of the techniques you’ve learned in this book, but above all, apply them with urgency, intensity, zeal and even a sense of desperation. Fight every battle as if you are running for your life.

Be the rabbit. Keep moving. Never, ever stop.

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20. The Fox and the Rabbit 1 51

Who will win? The fox or the rabbit?

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