Promotional campaign

I'm currently in the process of rolling out a big promotional campaign for my niche product, The Men's Grooming Handbook http://www.mensgroominghandbook.com/.

I have decided to sell my book through a distributor who partners with Amazon.com. After a bit more paperwork, The Men's Grooming Handbook will be available to a mass audience via the largest book seller on the internet. Besides the distributor, I will focus on article marketing to drive extra traffic to my site. The articles will be excerpts from my book, but will contain links to my website. The extra traffic should produce more direct sales.

Are we in a recession?

Recently, I've heard talk about a recession. Some people say we're already in a recession while others say the U.S. is not in a recession. With so many opinions and false facts, who are you to believe? I believe that in order to be successful, you must deal in facts not opinions.

The U.S. is not technically in a recession. A recession is technically confirmed when there are two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth. While we are not technically experiencing a recession, there are indicators that help determine whether we are approaching or have approached a turn in the economy.

According to the Economist, an economic cycle can be understood with three types of indicators: leading indicators, coincidental indicators, and lagging indicators. Leading indicators turn before the cycle, Coincidental indicators turn with the cycle, and lagging indicators turn after the cycle. Examples of leading, coincidental, and lagging indicators include:

Leading indicators:

• interest rates
• manufacturing orders
• business confidence
• Unemployment

Coincident indicators:

• Measure of GDP

Lagging indicators:

• Job vacancies
• Manufacturing capacity

By understanding what the facts are saying, you'll seperate yourself from the pack and be better equiped to make investment decisions.

Online Marketing

I had the opportunity to hear a presentation from the creators of ibreadcrumbs.com. The presentation discussed the importance of having a presence on the web and how the world is transitioning from old media to new media.

Old Media includes:

• newspapers
• magazines
• radio
• television

New Media includes:

• Forums
• Social networking (myspace, linkedin.com)
• Online newsletters
• Discussion forums
• Podcasts

New media is allowing information to travel faster than ever. Reviews about a product are instantly known and shared on sites such as myspace.com. New media is allowing the world to operate on a global scale. Websites like elance.com allow users to outsource almost everything from virtual assistance to legal advice.

Entrepreneurs need to learn how to use new media for their advantage. By leveraging these media outlets, entrepreneurs will be able to reach global markets and get their messages out faster than ever.

Goals

A thought occurred to me yesterday. I was talking with a group of people and we were discussing our lives and anything new that had occurred. As we went around the table, friends and relatives began to talk about their jobs and the direction they saw in their future. To my surprise many who were talking said things like "school's not for me," or "I just want to get my electricians license so that I can get a promotion." While these were "acceptable" answers, something amazed me. Others at the table had similar answers. How can a group of young kids be so willing to settle for a mediocre lifestyle with a paycheck to paycheck mentality? How could these people be happy looking for a secure job that only paid the bills? What happened to their fire, their dreams, their aspirations? Somewhere along their life they decided that it was OK to settle!

I feel that the size of the questions you ask or get asked determine the size of your outcome. Instead of asking , "Did you graduate high school?" ask "What college are you going to?" Even better, instead of asking "What college are you going to?" ask "What's your college GPA?" or "When are you graduating?" Somewhere along their lives they stopped asking themselves big questions. Some stopped asking themselves big questions and others were never asked big questions when they were growing up.

The reason why some people are billionaires and others are not, is because they ask themselves different questions. Wealthy people ask, "When are you taking your company public?" or "What is your next business venture?" They train their brains to think differently.

In order to change our outcome. We need to change our questions.