Marketing Insight: Keywords which don't tell you anything about the Gorilla in the room

(photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/arcticpuppy/)

Marketing Insight: Not getting the right keywords
won't tell you anything about the gorilla in your room.

That's the problem with a lot of these niches we deal with. When we are simply trying to sell a product, we fail because some of these niches simply don't have buyers in them. And worse, some people are telling you that the way you find buyers is to see if people are advertising in that area. (Really? How come people are advertising where there isn't even any traffic? Google says they do - just look on their Adwords tool and see where there is "competition" even when there aren't enough traffic results to make up a monthly tally...)

Since I got myself all worked up with that (above-linked) post, I then had to see what was actually going on.

So I set up my Keywords Genies: Google Adwords Tool and RankTracker and started to get to work figuring this all out. I started using Google Adwords to see if it would give me bigger and bigger traffic keywords through its synonyms. After I amassed about 12,000 keywords, then I quit to digest them by OpenOffice database.

Now, this is completely the reverse of what my research says to do. I was purposely looking for stuff that couldn't possibly be a niche - waaayy too big. Of course, one of the first things I found out was that Google and WordTracker don't agree on what the traffic for something actually is. (Big surprise - all these tools only deal with their own estimates of traffic. Your mileage may vary, as well - only your own analytics knows for sure.)

But what I did find is that there seem to be a huge number of really good one and two-word keywords with decent KEI. Even though they could (and some did) have literally a trillion pages of competition. No, you couldn't dream of trying to get these on their own. So the niche theory of marketing empire-building still holds.

The review of these niches and their main keywords started showing something else (other than the fact I was really straining RankTracker and WordTracker - you can only check about 240 KW's at a time before WordTracker shuts you down). That something else was the point that people who search on Google are just that - lookers. Doesn't mean they are buyers. And you have to check that keyword on eBay or Amazon to see if people are actually able to sell something like that.

Even more striking was the observation that very little "stuff" was turning up with these keywords. Specific camera's, or toys, or gadgets or books or authors weren't coming up. But the big-ticket Maslow-pyramid-type phrases were. As niches.

But didn't I just say you couldn't sell anything in a niche that didn't have buyers in it?

Sure. The trick is that the motivations to buy are there, not the stuff you can sell.

This means that people are actually searching for their wants and feelings, not just specific stuff they want to buy - although that happens as well, but not in two words or less (most of the time, anyway).

Your niches show up in four-word or longer phrases.

But something even more interesting showed up - you aren't selling stuff, you're offering solutions.

All of these wants and feelings people put in their search engine forms - these are just problems they are having in their lives (more or less). What they are plugging away at searching for are solutions which would improve their lives.

Again, go back to Maslow and Cialdini. When you take these two giants together, you see what people as individuals and as groups/niches are trying to solve in their lives. All these things people buy are somewhere on Maslow's pyramid. And what you see selling on eBay or Amazon are translations of these items into the tribe-dominated Cialdini 6 (or 7) principle triggers.

Being blonde, young, trim, athletic, rich, famous, etc. - all of these have definite products associated with them. But below all these states are very definite wants and needs - and between those and the products that represent them are the person's feelings. Which are what all sales are based on - feelings.

My point in this actually goes back to what I've spend the bulk of this life on - personal improvement and self-growth. Recently, I've been studying marketing to see how selling this type stuff is done. And so, now I know how to sell almost anything - find out what stresses are hitting people's lines and offer solutions. Stresses are tied into feelings - and they come from a person's purpose, something seemingly disrelated to marketing.

The reason I'm telling you all this is to keep you up to speed with what I've been discovering.

Practically, with proper market research, starting with keywords and then finding what products are selling in that niche - you could conceivably sell sun-tan oil to Eskimo's if you wanted.

It's all sitting there in the keywords.

So, go ahead, compile your own list of 12,000 Google Adwords and see what comes up.

May you be just as pleasantly surprised.

Hot Search Engine Keyword Niche Tip - Getting keywords from news

Getting hot keyword niches from the news

Just a fast one for you. I outlined a way to get hot keywords from the news before.

But this was limited, since I haven't found a good keyword extraction tool. Most give you gobble-de-gook, which you then have to sort through.

Today, I tried a different approach:

1. On a top website (I tried US News and World Report), look for their most visited and most emailed stories.
2. Scrape these and drop into Google's Adword KeywordExternalTool.
3. Now you have the synonyms which are a gold mine.
4. Get the text file and drop into RankTracker to find the KEI.
5. Take off the low KEI (>2.0) and high competition (>3 or 4 million).
6. What's left is the top niches of the week.

I wound up with about 8 decent keywords (out of 190+ that Google gave me).

However, when you run these through Web1Marketing's Keyword Competition Estimator for exact phrase, intitle, and inanchor - you wind up finding that these terms may or may not be really all that hot.

Exact competition for three of them still wound up with over 120K in competition -and this is real competition.

Next step, if you have a product or a pressing interest, would then be to take those 8 terms and through them through Google's tool again to find the sub niches. And you can do them one at a time, since you only get 200 terms each time you try.

Then, take the sub niches and promote to them - which will eventually get you top standing in these 8 high KEI terms we just found.

Now for my use, this is just fine - since I'll then use these phrases as inspiration for cartoons. But I'd be better off also going that route, because social media can get buried as well. And this digresses.

But really for me, I'd probably do something like log into FriendFeed and take their most popular stories of the week and run those titles through Google/Ranktracker/Web1Marketing - because these are a bit more real than the news. (Propeller or NewsVine look most promising at this point - as some of this other doesn't look to be all that useful. Haven't tested it, though.)

Anyway, it's interesting to see what the Google Adwords Tool can do...

Marketing Insight Tip #4 - Bell Curve for Small Business

(photo credit: J. Phil)

How to use the Bell Curve in your small business marketing

Hope the graphic above isn't too overwhelming. It just points out the wide variety of applications for the bell curve. It's that way because this oddball curvey line describes a natural phenomenon which all businesses encounter and only a few really know and use.

Recently, I was reminded of this by some huckster I was still getting email from. He said that "this guy" was the best in writing sales letters and articles. So I checked his "this guy" out. The claim to fame was that his sales letters and landing pages routinely had a 2% conversion rate.

What he was saying was that he could write an average page and get average results consistently. Any sales page is supposed to get that type of result, almost regardless of how it's written. 2% conversion is what spam is based on. Volume contact, volume conversion - but the same percentage.

Let me introduce some numbers here:
96% - general public who are in some other niche market and who somehow found your site.
80% / 20% - attributed to an economist named Pareto, this combination tells you where the bulk (80%) of your sales are coming from and what percentage of your subscribers (20%) are making these purchases. It also tells you that most of your problems in your marketing are coming from a small percentage of areas.
3-5% - the number of people you can expect to have the best results with any line of service - these are the "rave results" you hear about (unless the guy is selling internet marketing, and has a bunch of hypesters on his page giving testimonials).

If you center these numbers along a curve, you'll see the 96%/80% in the center, with the 20% split to both sides, the 3-5% on the extreme edges. That's the Bell Curve. Now, if you set these up all from right to left, you get an exponential drop, 96-80-20-5-3%. This is the curve used to explain the Long Tail. Same numbers, different graphic.

Applications for these are numerous.

Efficiency:
Narrow down to your top 20% of your products and put 80% your marketing emphasis on these. Don't discontinue the others, unless they fall into the category of causing 80% of your problems. Focus on your bread-winning efforts - what is really bringing home the bacon. Pay attention only to the essential core of your business. Clean up the rest as needful, but never spend more than 20% of your week at these. Set those others up on near-automatic and let them run. If your metrics show they suddenly become popular, then elevate them to your 80% area. If they are consistently causing you returns/refunds, ditch them without sorrow.

Big Box:
When you concentrate on a narrow area, you have better success than using a shotgun approach. This is the secret to Long Tail marketing, and the failure of corporate businesses who try to be everything for all customers. Wal-Mart knows this. They don't carry stuff which doesn't sell and sell well. You can't get products which are either high-end (which sell far fewer, but at a higher profit margin) or extremely cheap (no profit margin unless you are a bulk reseller.)

You'll find some representative (20%?) products for most (80%?) of what you want. Sam Walton figured out long ago that you could sell a lot more for slightly less and so improve your profit margins tremendously. If you want a particular type of screw or hinge, go to a hardware store - what Wal-Mart carries are general wood screws and common butt and strap hinges to repair average jobs around the average American house or garage. You won't find fine woodworking hinges here.

Niches:
Where the small business outperforms the big box stores is in the exact niche. By finding and marketing to a specific set of people who want a particular and exact types of products, you will then be able to service these more precisely and will be rewarded with their loyalty. Corporations often confuse this one when they get "big".

I used to work for Brookstone - in their warehouse. I'd see the catalog and note that they no longer had unique tools in it - stuff that you dreamed about getting for your own shop. They only had stuff which was in other catalogs: radio-electronics, special mattresses, massage chairs. When they replaced their CEO, I wrote him a note about this. His reply was that they could no longer compete with Big Boxes and so had themed their products around home improvement. Huh?

Look, they built their brand on having unique tools for guys. And this is why their Father Day sales were great. When they expanded, they decided to go into competition with Lowes, Home Depot, Sears, etc. In other words, they decided to go Big Box. Meanwhile Duluth and other catalogs started servicing their original customers with unique tools and products. Why are they having trouble in this economy? Because they aren't selling anything essential. And any guy can tell you, having the right tool at the right time is essential - and everyone appreciates a gift. Brookstone abandoned it's successful policy and is reaping the whirlwind.

Long Tail Niches: This is where small businesses shine. Gary Vaynerchuk took his family liquor store and expanded it to a dynasty of selling wine to people online. He did it through education - infotainment. Go to his site and you'll see how he does it. (And better yet, he'll tell you how he does it.) Simple concept, brilliantly executed. Lots of people can buy different types of wine if they know which one to get for what use. The trick is that people don't know - and so make some regular videos that inform people about this area and your sales increase.

By concentrating on just wine and education, he was able to expand his family liquor store to an international success. For any small business, this means that suddenly you're not nailed down to only having the local people near your store able to access your products - you can ship these anywhere in the world. For small businesses to sell to niche consumers everywhere on the planet - this is a no-brainer. The Internet is the great equalizer - if you know how to use it.

Conversions:
Back to where we started. Look, it's a statistical phenomenon, proved over and over. Out of 100 pitches, 2-3 people will buy. Spam and telemarketing took off because they were able to lower the overhead (cost of doing business) and increased the volume dramatically. So sales picked up - dramatically. Unless you are doing something really wrong (like links that don't work), then you are going to have this type of percentage.

What you are concerned with is not so much initial conversions, but repeat traffic. These are subscribers. People who know you and your brand and keep coming back for more. When you see people say they have a "7% conversion rate", know that they have some repeat business in there. When you see "17% conversion" you know they are missing some prime "velvet-rope" opportunities - where they should be selling exclusive access to part of their site just for repeat customers.

I know this route - from working for an international corporation which dealt in self-help books, tapes, and counseling. There's been an external analysis of their production (not paid for by that corporation or connected to them) which found that about 70-80% of their initial course completions left after the first service. (That's a 2-3 day course, given for a couple of hours a day when the person can fit it in after work or during the day. Cheap - about $50, plus course materials.) Now, another 10% left in the first year. By year three, they lost about 97% of the people who had walked in their door for one reason or another. But they made their weekly millions off the 3% which was left. Those generally spent between $50K and $100K over the next 5 years. Each. They were put into more and more exclusive areas and paid more and more. By the time they got to the top, they had each personally invested millions (literally) in services and materials to that corporation. All on a "velvet rope" subscriber basis.

That corporation didn't really need the bulk of their prospects that walked in the front door. They just became extremely efficient for the few who had the money that corporation needed. Now, I don't think they've really done this analysis themselves, or they'd see how their marketing (something along the lines of your money is going to saving this planet as we expand internationally) is really false. And they'd also see that they are throwing away more than they're making. But it keeps the few continuing to buy in. And to that corporation, perhaps, marketing (and their millions in weekly income) is all that counts.

How you can put this to use:
OK, I've gone on too long in this area for most readers. What I'm saying here is that

• the small guy can do whatever the big guy is doing, with the leverage of the Internet.
• Just make sure that you are getting a broad exposure (cast a wide net) while concentrating on a smallish niche which is profitable.
• And cherish your repeat clients.

Warren Buffet says (who is actually quoting Andrew Carnegie, who got it from someone else): "You can put all your eggs in one basket - you just have to watch that basket real closely."

Good luck - and good hunting!

Secret News Keyword Strategy I probably shouldn't tell...

(photo credit: Bullish Bankers)

Secret News Keyword Strategy I probably shouldn't tell...

Here's a dirt-simple method I just twigged on - and I'm telling this, first because you should know a fast way to get on top of breaking trends before they become too saturated for marketing, and second - because it's probably not now a secret. And besides that, anyone whose been following this blog faithfully deserves whatever I can give them. Finally, I'm not going to be using it - because my type of content takes too long to come up with to do this daily, unless research shows this to be wildly profitable...

This keyword strategy is designed to put you at the front of every rising trend with the exact profitable keyword phrases, based on what mainstream news media is shouting from the roof tops (whether it's true, makes sense, or not)

The secret keyword strategy sequence:

1. You know Google Trends, right? News is down there on the bottom graph. Take the top news sites (I suppose you could do this with top blogs, as long as they change daily) and use a keyword tool to scrape what Search Engines will say their keywords are.
2. Now, take that keyword list and run it through a KEI generator, like Rank-Tracker (no, I'm not an affiliate, I just like the tool) - and find out what people are actually looking for which is related to what is in the news. KEI of 3 or above, at least 20 or above on daily searches.
   
3. Work out your R/S quotient and line these up that way - which will give you profitable keyword phrases with the lowest competition for the demand. Work on these first.
4. Then you simply write good link-bait copy and link to products.

And repeat this as much as you can that day - hell, if it works out like it looks, you could afford to hire people to write copy for you. Reason being is that you can use this method to get on the rising side of trends and establish your market base before that market becomes saturated. The next day, you start over. The trick is to get in, find the exact keyword, pop up some short posts with a link to a product that assists/solves that problem - and is available for immediate download. Call it "the secret of news niche marketing".

Obviously, a saturated market has low KEI and high R/S ratio, even when the traffic dies off (the other profitable side of the market curve). And the only one's making income in that scene are big box stores with tons of very cheap inventory - and can compete on price.

But doing the above gets you out ahead of the field, ahead of that curve.

The downside of this is that its entirely possible - since people don't trust the news - that they are barking up the wrong tree and are way behind the curve. They do tend to run in herds - and occasionally off cliffs all together.

(And if I were a journalist or had one as a buddy, I'd key them in on this strategy. This is the way they could find and get ahead of rising trends by finding which subjects are actively being looked up - and have peoples' interest - and which are already saturated with tons of competing pages/stories already. And guess what - your scoop won't be what you think it is... But your readership will climb as you always are writing ahead of the curve and can - mostly - start spotting a nascent trend. Tip: take your keyword and put it back into Google Trends to see what it's doing - write on all the uptrending ones.)

Don't understand some of these terms? OK, then either skip this post, or look them up. Hate to do this to you, but this post is for SEO-savvy people - and only those who are smart enough to find this blog. If you are natively that smart and want to understand what I just said, you can search this blog, as I've gone over this material before. The answers are all there.

Good Hunting!

Waste Affiliate MoJo on Not-Your-Niche Products.

How to Waste Your Affiliate Mojo on Not-Your-Niche Products.

Just saw a post from Jeremy Vaught about sticking to your niche - and only niches. And this brings up how you can simply waste all your time trying to promote affiliate products you know nothing about and could care less - just the money, honey.

There is no - "just the money, honey" - in life. Check out Earl Nightingale's "Strangest Secret" or his "Lead the Field Series". You only get money after you've contributed something of value to someone else.

That's what I found on eBay - if your aim in life is to become a Big Box retailer, sure you can "make money" on eBay. You are retailing things/stuff/schlock for just above your cost to people who believe they are getting a real bargain. However, not all of us want or are interested in being the next Sam Walton.

Find your niche and market from there (niche-market). Sure, you can expand to related niches, but that's the point - you have an option. If you like retailing and selling - great, be that. But retailers and salesmen have their own niches they operate in. Wal-Mart doesn't try to cover everything possible - they have key items from most the key categories people want. The products are fair-enough quality, but are cheap enough so they can make a profit and still undersell just about everyone.

The story I tell, though, is about the Wal-Mart bicycle repairman. There isn't one, of course. This town was all up in arms because a Wal-Mart was coming in, just outside of town. Doom and gloom was settling in. This bicycle shop owner went in when they opened up, looked around, and came back to put a sign in his store. It read, "Can you tell me the name of the Wal-Mart bicycle repairman." And his business boomed. Sure, they might by a cheap bike at Wal-Mart - but they'd bring it to him to get assembled, and adjusted, and repaired. His traffic and income increased because he was able to amplify the demand in his own niche.

It's not like your mojo got up and went because you have some "new competition". The best way to deal with "competition" is to out-create them in your niche. Don't try to compete with them on their terms. Raising prices because you have much better-quality items and give real personal service and all sorts of qualified technical advice from your niche - that will bring tons of new and repeat traffic into your shop. As long as you mean it. But cutting prices when you can't possibly compete with a mega-store - where your product is just one of several thousand they stock... sure suicide.

Look Jack Humphrey is still pretty much unknown, although he cuts a wide swath in his particular niche. And pulls down 10's of thousands every month - because he is very good at his particular staked out territory in Internet Marketing. But you hardly hear a mention of him in social media circles - unless they are also into Internet Marketing. But Jack thrives on social media... that's what he's selling to people: how to market their stuff via social media.

Social Media, however, doesn't even see him. Because it is so vast it covers the entire realm of the Internet. And all the social media gurus have their own interests. Sure, they market, but few are devotedly into that niche - they are into their own niche.

And that's the point. Look, become an expert in one little thing and then find affiliate or your own product which solves that one little thing. And if you promote it right and get yourself known - everyone looking for that one little thing will come to you for your solution.

The guy who invented the better mousetrap and got the world stomping a new path to his door - he didn't also work on rat-traps, beaver-traps, bear-traps, politician-traps. He perfected his one little mousetrap. Now, once this is successfully bringing in income, he is able to perfect other models, and perhaps take on other denizens of the house - yes, rats, but probably cockroaches, flies, moths, wasps, spiders - and all sorts of things that people who want mice out of their house would also like help with.

So - invest you mojo in your one niche. And keep it there. Wild oats goes only so far when spread to the winds. Keep it in your own field and expect a grand and bountiful harvest.

Cheers!