A phrase that helps me is “reduce it to the ridiculous”. Sometimes when I have done research in a discussion group and pulled real time questions, I will continue asking the jounalism five – who, what, why, where, and how.

I like the way you’re adding the email sign up in each blog post. How’s that working? Is there a plugin for that or are you adding that manually?

Anyway, I enjoyed reading this article and being reminded about all this.

(1) either an illusion – this just looks to be simple
(2) or has small effect
(3) or is just part of the big story

Let me give an example.

One of the core rules of blogging success – ‘just create great content and everything is going to be fine’ – what a perfectly simple phrase. Moreover, this is not a hoax – great content is the basis of blogging.

But, if you are straightforward, then you need to tell a person that this is also about pushing your great content to the eyes of the targeted visitors, otherwise no one will spread the word of a mouth about this info.

And pushing the content is about SEO, or catching the people on the forums or chats and so on.

So, I hate when something is too difficult. But too often I saw how the viable “keep it simple” approach was nothing but an illusion.

I think many of us have been conditioned by the gurus to think that content is the key selling characteristic of a successful product – but it’s not. What really makes a product sell is the marketing that surrounds it. As such, we end up laboring under the false belief that somehow, magically, if we just cram our info product which every single relevant strategy under the sun, it will be flying off our digital shelves.

The result? We end up with a brilliant product that doesn’t sell because we invested all that time into product development rather than marketing. This leads to discouragement, disappointment and, eventually, a burnt-out Internet Marketer who gives up on ever making money online and moves on to a 9-5 job.

Perfectionism is great – but you should always, always remember that content is not what sells your product. Marketing does – and if you really want to invest a LOT of your time into something, focus on marketing rather than content.

Remember, your sales copy is what your visitors will see first when they get to your site!

Great article! Those 5 steps could be the first 5 steps of someone’s entire online career.

Let me tell you a short story as proof..

When I first created my product, which (by the way) was an audio interview, I had no idea that it would later lead to creating a much larger “product”, again with no content of my own, that generated 6-figures in 10 days. If I had not taken action and taken the steps that someone else told me to do, I wouldn’t be where I am today working full time from home.

One thing leads to another. But it starts with step 1 and taking action.

As I first heard Mike Litman say, “you don’t have to get it right, you just have to get it going!”. And your article is the perfect “get it going” blueprint!! Would love to reprint it on my blog.

FYI: I’ve been following you for about 5 years now. I’m a customer of your Internet Marketing Protege course a few years back and I have to say I wore those cassette tapes thin listening to you! You’ve played a huge role in my success online over the years. Thanks Terry.

Dave Lovelace
http://DavidLovelace.com

One of my favorite nonfiction books is The Paradox of Choice by Barry Schwartz. It’s about the effects of too many choices vs. a restricted number of options. Fascinating stuff.

Ryan