Rock Star Business Series is Live For Less Than a Burrito

This morning we opened the door to the new Rock Star Business Series. Essentially it is a training platform for young entrepreneurs to learn online tools and how to apply them to their brand and their business. It costs less than a burrito to get started.

Here is a video I shot with Ryan Browne, a student in the first round of the Rock Star Series

So, this is not the sales pitch, if you want that, head on over to the Sales Page.

I did want to say that I am extremely happy with the effort and the value we have been able to provide to this next group of young entrepreneurs. We have lowered the cost and improved the value. There is no better feeling than getting an email that says your training has helped them do something cool.

If you are a young entrepreneur and want to join this group of young entrepreneurs, go check out the sales page. I think you are going to love it.

Other Notes and Tidbits
I'll be in Atlanta this weekend for those that want to catch up. Looking forward to another marketing conference, the SEC Championship and seeing some old friends.

This Thanksgiving we spent the better half of the morning with our homeless friends in Orlando. The event was moving and really brings out the best in people. Check out the full wrap up on the Rock For Hunger Blog.

Have a great week.

-Greg

Traveling Man Updates from ASE + Cure For The Run

It has been a busy few weeks here and I wanted to write down some updates and throw up some pictures to track this Rock Star Life of mine!

Label 2.0 has officially launched and we have over 20 members at this point. We have an amazing partner that I can officially announce soon that is going to help build this business into the music marketing platform that I always wanted it to be. With that said, here is how things are progressing.

We went live the first week of August very quietly, with a blog post and an email to my mailing list and the people that were on our early bird list. We had our first signup within 2 hours. What a relief that was. Now we are smooth sailing with new modules, live calls and training as well as refining the sales page and marketing strategies (which could have been stronger from the start, but we live and we learn).

Next up was a wild trip to Jersey, NYC and Philly.

I got to see the Statue of Liberty for the 1st time as well as hanging out with J-Ro around the city.

(at the Statue of Liberty on a nice afteroon cruise)

(at Rockerfeller Center)

Affiliate Summit was a blast, thanks to Missy Ward for hooking me up and giving me an opportunity to meet some amazing people and learn some really cool stuff to apply to my business.

Clickbooth was the crew I was partying it up with as Eric Schechter invited me to their bloggers dinner and Beer Pong Party. It was a great event and ever better that I got to take home $500 from taking 1st place.

(Clickboth Blogger Dinner)

I met some superstar bloggers from John Chow to Chris Brogan and Julien Smith (go get their book Trust Agents which I think goes on sale today).

(John Chow and Eric after the Clickbooth Contest drawing - I was the film guy)

(Chris Brogan, Julien Smith and I at ASE09)

After New York it was on to Philly for a wedding and reconnecting with old friends. We had a blast.


The week back saw no slowing down as SomaCow and Rock For Hunger teamed up for the Cure For The Run. Through the event we were able to raise over $3,000 to combat poverty and homelessness in the Downtown Orlando area and had a great time in the process. You can read a wrap up post over on the Rock For Hunger Blog.

(Jen from SomaCow and I at Cure For the Run)

If you are looking for the thoughtful marketing and Gen-Y posts that used to take up space here, they can now be found at Rock Star Lifestyle Design. This site will primarily be used to keep up with my Rock Star Life and all the things I am up to as I try to save the world.

-Greg

Quick Update

This blog has been pretty dormant lately and with good reason! Things have been progressing nicely with some projects, new sites and opportunities. Here is the quick lowdown:

RockStarLifestyleDesign - This is a new site that I launched quietly about a month ago geared towards helping 20somethings focus on their life outlook as well as some Internet Marketing techniques and a weekly section on Rock Star Recipes.

Gen-Y Rock Stars - I have been trying to get back into the music game for a little while now and have been fading in and out for the past 2 years or so. It seems that fate took a turn for me and I will be fully embracing the music world again and I couldn't be happier. Gen-Y Rock Stars will be getting a makeover, some new tools and a much needed content facelift with a focus on actual artist accomplishments, interviews and more tactic and tip focused as opposed to reviewing companies.

Oh and Label 2.0 is going to launch now on August 1st. It is going to be a soft launch and is going to be a life changer for me and for those that get in on the ground level. Sign up here.

Intern Opportunity - If you know anyone in the Orlando area that is looking for a fall internship opportunity, I am looking for someone for around 10 hours a week to interview bands, shoot videos and all that good stuff. It's a pretty tough job, but someone has to do it. Shoot me an email to marketing@genyrockstars.com for all those interested. (There will be a monthly stipend and bonus opportunities)

Writing Streak - I have been writing a lot lately for some pretty cool and high profile sites. Here are some links to check out. I want to thank the authors/blog owners for letting me tell my tale on their sites.

Blue Collar Personal Branding - The Personal Branding Blog
How to Surf on Tuesday and Save the World Thursday - Free Pursuits
Lifestyle Design Tips That Rock Stars Can Teach You - Workshifting
Connecting with Bloggers Outside the Music Niche - Audiolife

Was also featured in Jun Loayza's Mashable post on business models for our work on Label 2.0.
Save the World Stuff - Rock For Hunger has been nothing short of phenomenal and busy! We hosted the iRock For Hunger Auditions at Backbooth on July 12 and 14 where we were able to raise over $1,000, get a ton of canned food and get back into the local music scene. The next festival meeting is next week for those that want to gt involved in the 4th Annual Extravaganza. Email me at greg@rockforhunger.org for more info and an invite.

We are also working with SomaCow for the 1st ever Cure for the Run, a 0.05k downtown on Wall Street, Satursday August 22nd at 4pm. Get more info and register here.

We are also in the middle of a site redesign and anyone willing to give some time to help us out, please email me - greg@rockforhunger.org. We have some great ideas to be even more efficient and get information to volunteers, donors and resources for the homeless in Orlando.

Affilliate Summit East - This is something that I am really excited about! I am heading to NYC August 8th for the largest affiliate marketing gathering there is. If you are going to be there, please say hello and any other New Yorkers are urged to say hello and meetup! You can still register for Affiliate Summit here before it sells out.

And it don't stop! If you are looking for my insightful stuff, you might want to switch the feed over to Rock Star Lifestyle Design, which is housing some great conversations from Social Change Rock Stars to Where $20,000 can be spent better than on college.

If you like knowing whatis going on in my Rock Star Life, than stick around. I promise some better posts and cooler stuff.

-Greg

New Video - Advanced Google Options for Personal Branding

As part of our super secret new site launch, we have created a really cool series of videos on technology and its impact on branding, building your business and creating your character. Today is the first video we are releasing to showcase some of the powers that are now in your hand. This video is all about the Google and how recent changes in its search results can impact your online brand and how people get information about you, your company or your brand online.

And here is that mean opt in form to join the 3 Days - 3 Actions Video Series I mention at the end. It's a really cool series where I think you are going to not only learn a lot, but also take the knowledge and put it into action to help propel your brand or company.

If you would like a sneak peak at RockStarLifestyleDesign.com, you can check it out here. A full post on what is going on will come soon. You can also learn about that 3 Days - 3 Videos series by clicking this blatant link to it here.

Please leave some feedback on both the video and the new site. I know there is some recycled content on there, we wanted to put some of the best posts from here over there as well as test out some of the formatting. Original stuff is coming soon, promise.

-Greg

This Saving the World Thing is Hard

photo by jaygoldman

Orlando is beaming with excitement right now. In the midst of an NBA title run for the first time in 15 years, we are a few shots and stupid, stupid mistakes from being up 3-1. The town has been painted blue and white. There are posters, signs, huge wall murals, Superman capes and cheezy t-shirts everywhere you look. And while Orlando and Central Florida are optimistic about a title run (even though Kobe might have us in check now) the city is still not ready to accept social change.

With the launch of Talk For Hunger publicly 2 weeks ago, it has been eye-opening and humbling to hear the stories of the vendors in their first weeks of changing not only their lives but the views of the homeless in our community. The vendors, along with Chris and the interns, have heard everything from "I don't support the homeless, they are all lazy panhandlers" to cold shoulders, fake cell phone conversations to down right "NO."

The Struggle For Local Social Change

It has been a bitch to get people to listen and open their minds to new ideas of improving our community. The local Orlando Chamber told us to get a membership and call the Coalition. When pursuing local advertisers we have heard words so downright awful it makes it hard to go into the next establishment. Here's a quote you can use

I hate the homeless, they come in and fuck up our bathrooms.

So how does anyone begin to implement new ideas and change society?

It starts "one by one." One person that opens up and walks in the door, goes out in the world and talks and then that talking, over time, becomes a tribe.

With blogging, we all work hard, write cool stuff and promote our posts to gain new readers one by one. Some achieve this feat faster than others and some just like finding one new reader a day, a week maybe even one new person a month who wants to hear their views, opinions and ideas.

With a business it starts with one patron at a time. You can't pack the house until that first customer walks through the door. That first customer brags about the service, food, products, etc, and that spreads to the best kind of business you can possibly have.

With your career, it starts with one job at a time. You get that entry level BS job at the firm that is supposed to suck out your life for 40 years, only to see that you are gaining skills, building relationships and preparing yourself for your next career move. Then you start building your career, your brand and your life based on one opportunity at a time.

With Talk For Hunger we only sold more than 10 issues in 1 day once. That's a shot in the gut for us, when we looked at models from South Florida and Chicago where individual vendors were selling 100-200 a day. But one-by-one we are building the brand, spreading a message and letting the readers, businessmen and women and everyone in between know that we are there making a difference.

Being the New Kid on the Block

photo by miskan

It doesn't matter if you are starting a business, helping the homeless or becoming a rock star, the beginning is both fun and shitty. It is exciting to see people like Jun Loayza stay on track despite living week to week. It is inspiring to see someone who panhandled his way to $20 a day, go out and create a life for himself while only making $10 a day. It is awesome to see someone challenge themselves to quit their day job or travel the world all while paving the way for others to do the same.

It's scary to see people leave conformity and comfort in the pursuit of an ideal lifestyle. It's hard to start a mission to save people the world has forgotten about. It's tough to give attention to anyone but yourself when faced with economic stress.

Being the new kid on the block with a mission to enhance lives, including your own, takes some balls, it takes character, planning, determination and will power to see the outcome to the end. That's a lot to ask of anyone, especially one with so many ambitions.

This year I made it a personal goal to employ 50 homeless in Orlando. I made it a goal to make a living doing the stuff that I love to do with the people and companies that I choose. I made it a goal to go overseas and teach technology and communication to the people that can benefit from it most. It is still going to be hard, but who the hell said saving the world was going to be easy?

I'd like to meet that guy.

-Greg Rollett

Makings of a Rock Star - Talk For Hunger Article

The following is my contribution to Issue #3 of Talk For Hunger. To learn more about Talk For Hunger and watch the sales process, please check out the Rock For Hunger Blog. If you would like a 12 issue subscription to Talk For Hunger, please click here.

The Makings of a Rock Star

Let’s start off by looking at our good friend Wikipedia and checking out the definition of a rock star. They say a rock star is “a member of a rock band, or a solo artist in the genre (the term usually implies celebrity status, or ‘stardom’).”

Let’s tweak that a little and give a better sense of the term. I define a rock star as someone who has the qualities to live their dreams, the skills to devote to the actions of those dreams and the confidence that comes with living and believing in those dreams.

Modern day Rock Stars include Oprah, Bono, Jay-Z and Barack Obama. You may attribute these individuals to their celebrity status, but it is in the believing that they can change the world through their dreams that makes them the rock stars that we know and believe in. None live a perfect life and some have even been taken off the positive path throughout their journey. All have traveled different roads with different backgrounds, but ultimately have followed their dreams to get to the position in their lives today.

Rock stars do not have to be celebrities. Anyone can dream and anyone can take action to turn that dream into a reality. Whether that is attaining financial security, career development, climbing the corporate ladder, bringing a product into society or helping another in need, we all have the abilities to be rock stars. Becoming a rock star is not an overnight process. Daily tasks and motivation are key factors in the process to attain “rock star status.”

Musicians practice diligently in their garage to perfect their craft. Then they spend months in studios recording it. Then comes playing shows, winning over fans and ultimately leveraging their network to attain their “rock star status,” it is no easy feat.

You too can become a rock star or help someone become a rock star. Help a child to read or solve math problems. Teach someone a new skill or learn a new one yourself – playing an instrument or learning how to use a new tool. Build a personal brand and put yourself in the same room and playing field as the big guys.

Dream big and take action on the little steps to start seeing that dream come to fruition. Our community is full of rock stars; they just need a stage to shine upon. How can you build the platform and life that you want?

Through Rock for Hunger, we have been able to create Rock Stars from our own community. Finding inner passion, training for skill sets and rediscovering dreams that impact an individual’s future are the types of missions and agendas that lie in our ability to impact the community.

Contact Greg at greg@rockforhunger.org and help make someone a Rock Star today!

Please consider buying a 12 issue subscription to Talk For Hunger. For $20 you get 12 issues mailed to your home, the electronic version of all 12 issues and a small donation to help pay for uniforms, badges and other operational costs. Stop Talking about the problem and be a part of the solution.

Liberation, Freedom and A Job Title Called Ass Kicker

(photo bydavidking)

Waking up at 9am, looking at the sand, the waves and the Corona in your hand may be a fantasy for a Tuesday, but for some it really is their Tuesday. And I'm not talking about movie stars and musicians. I am talking about those that have created businesses and lifestyles to make their time work for them and not the other way around. Freedom businesses if you will.

In the 20-something market there is lots of chatter on entrepreneurship or branching out, starting these businesses that you can work from anywhere, make a great living and be free from cubicle hell, or something like that, all while creating a purpose or mission in your life. Disclaimer aside, this is my mental path as well.


There are some awesome bloggers and writers in this space that get me going every morning and today I found a really cool manifesto by Jonathon Mead called, "Join the Liberation Revolution." As good as it was I found it even more interesting that it was part of Clay Collins's Project Mojave Team and launch. I had heard that Johnathon joined his team, but wasn't sure on the level - according to the Project Mojave Team Page Jonathon is the Director of Ass Kicking. That is wicket sweet. This 20-something page "Manifesto" is really well written and has even a better design around it - it comes highly personally recommended (even for you cubicle dwellers).

So why am I sharing this?
This one sentence is the reason I want to share this:

So for the sake of clarity, all of your reasons for hating your boring, lifeless job are valid. It doesn’t matter if you think someone else has it worse off than you. It doesn’t matter if there are starving children is Somalia. You’ll be in a much better position to contribute and make a difference in this world if you’re doing something you’re passionate about, or at least interested in.

That's a great piece of writing right there Mr. Mead. I would like to clarify a bit further. You DO NOT NEED to ditch the cubicle. You DO NOT NEED to switch fields, careers or locations. You NEED to change your mindset. Not an easy thing to do. Sometimes that does mean that you need to change careers, jobs, location, partners, whatever.

Personal Freedom and Personal Rewards as a Young Pro

I have been teaching the Personal Branding and Career Development thing for almost 2 years now and never really knew it. In the process I have been coming up with ways to really define what makes you tick, or better yet get up in the morning. I wrote about wanting to save the world while driving a $400,000 car that emits shitty gasses and toxins. The cool thing is that this is possible, in fact, it's more possible today than ever in our lives. What it takes is action.

3 Actions to Start your Personal Freedom Today

1. Google your name and determine if you like what you see. It's a weird way of looking at yourself in the mirror. When I Google my name I see this site, which has a lot of work to go towards becoming the brand I truly want, not what I thought I wanted. I then see Rock For Hunger, and Twitter and EG and other things that make me really proud. What does your Google results page make you feel?
2. What is the number 1 thing you want to start doing in your life and name the top 3 road blocks in your way. Start knocking out those road blocks right now. For me, I want to surf on Tuesdays. Roadblocks include the chain on my desk, no board and scared to death of sharks and the damn shark attacks keep happening in new Smyrna. Step 1 get rid of the chain.
3. Go read the "Manifesto" I opened this post up with. The idea is to start thinking outside the box even if you like living your life in it. Start giving meaning to what you do everyday. Download it here and it would be wise to opt-in to get more of their stuff.

Are you enjoying your Tuesday?

-Greg Rollett

Make the Most of Your 30 Seconds of Fame

(Greg, Patrick and Chris on the set of the Daily Buzz)

Last Friday I had the pleasure of hanging out in the Daily Buzz studios on the Full Sail campus at 6am. I was up early with Chris and Patrick getting ready to talk about Rock For Hunger and some of our initiatives including Talk 4 Hunger and my personal RFH project the "Homeless Lifestyle Design" course.

Over the last few weeks I have been fortunate to be on a bunch of live news stations talking about everything from Personal Branding to Advanced Online Job Seeking to Digital Dirt and Rock For Hunger across a bevy of networks including the CW (Daily Buzz), ABC and FOX. On these live-on-air opportunities I have learned some very valuable lessons that have increased my confidence and appearance on the networks and helped to spread the message that I want to connect with the audience. These tv segments are quick yet can be very powerful to collect new leads, get sales or increase exposure about you or your company (and it looks great on the resume). Here is a list of my 6 biggest takeaways from being live on the news.

Match your style to location. When getting dressed make sure you look at yourself in the mirror while sitting down, or outside or in a crowd or whatever environment you will be in. Knowing your settings is crucial to looking natural and authentic. In one interview on FOX I had a suit on and the jacket was a little large...and you could totally notice. Had I knew it would have risen so high I would have stuck with just a shirt and a tie. Knowing where you are going to be for the interview is key to looking great on camera.

Guide the interviewer. Most quick tv interviews throw softball questions at you and they know little to nothing about you or what you are going to say. Generally we hear:

• Tell us about your organization
• How did you get started?
• Where did the idea come from?
• Tell me about those programs
• How can we get involved or more information
  

The key is to guide them to get to the main point that you want to portray. With Rock For Hunger, we have been doing a brief explanation of how we started and go right into the program we are trying to promote, getting the interviewer to lead into questions about the program.

Rehearse your points. This is one that should be common sense, but you need to have a game plan and know your stuff. When the lights are in your face and the teleprompter is distracting you, the more you have rehearsed and played it out in your head the better off you will be. I have my personal branding and Rock For Hunger elevator pitches down so well that I can deliver them with any distraction in my way because I deliver them often and I practice them before every big speaking gig.

Know your timing. News stations are on top of things and know to the second how long segments are going to last. If you know how long you are given for your segment you can begin to tailor your message to fit the allotted time. Trust me when I say that you have way less time than you think. The FOX News segments I did lasted close to 2:30, then you look at the Daily Buzz where Chris and I split less than 2 minutes.

Ask for drops (or plugs). Drops are what the news anchors say coming into and going out of commercials. For the job fair we promoted in April we were on the news Monday - Thursday for a total of 10 minutes. However from 6am - 9am before every commercial break the news plugged the event and told the audience about the story / interview coming up. This is vital as it helps to brand what it is that you came on the show to talk about. If you have the opportunity, ask the anchors or producers to say your name, your company and what you are talking about. For instance on the Daily Buzz before commercial break we had the anchor say,

"Get ready to rock...for hunger with Greg and Chris who are going to be talking about how they use music to help the local community. Check out Rock For Hunger after the break."

This is very effective for brand awareness and keeps butts in the seat waiting for you to come on their screen (or at least hit the DVR), but you need to help guide them if at all possible.

Call the viewer to action. Stay on topic, stay focused and deliver a call to action. The news is going to direct the viewer to their website so you may need to throw in your own call to action to get people to your site and skip the middleman. Be respectful and thankful, but by being on tv you have the opportunity to speak to the very market that can buy your stuff, support your cause or come to your event. Don't forget the mission and purpose of the press opportunity.

Now that I have had some great press opps I hope to share some really valuable stuff with you guys including:

• How to get on tv
• The responses and affect of being on tv
• Direct response marketing of tv advertisements

If you have any questions about live tv interviews, please ask and share in the comments.

-Greg Rollett

Rock Star Newsletter

This has been a long time coming for this site and well while sitting in the airport awaiting my flight to Vegas, I decided to get it started! Here's the dealio. Any growing business likes to communicate with its customers, community members and people that are just dropping by. With Internet businesses and people online, email is super effective and creates a great way for you to get cool information when you want it. So please opt-in below, tell your friends and you will start to see some cool stuff from me and the Rock Star Lifestyle Team.

Rock Stars hate SPAM, so we don't send it, nor do we sell your information or any of that jazz, just good ol stuff from me and the gang helping to put my stuff together. Opt-out at any time!

Thanks and have a great weekend.

-Greg

You Don't Have To Be Creative To Be a Rock Star

(photo by juicystyle)

Over the last week I have given 2 presentations to a group of homeless and severely low income individuals in Orlando on how to leverage the Internet to find a job. The courses I taught were not about jobs. They weren't really about careers either. I was talking about confidence, realizations and actions to create the life you want now, as opposed to the life you are supposed to have given your circumstances.

Be honest now...the best personal brands on the Internet are:

• Marketers (Dan Schawbel)
• Social Media Gurus (b/s terminology btw)(Chris Brogan, Robert Scoble)
• Writers (Penelope Trunk, Tim Ferriss)
• PR Peeps(Brian Solis)
• Entrepreneurs(Jun Loayza, Ted Murphy, Guy Kawasaki)

The best personal brands on the InterWeb are not:

• Construction Workers
• Nurses
• Doctors
• Lawn Care Companies
• Pizza Makers
• You Get My Drift

But why not?

After getting to know the crowd I let it fly and started thinking of ways that blue collars, trade professionals and small business owners can capitalize on being an industry rock star, something that is more valuable than the marketing rock stars, the gurus, the egos of the web.

If small businesses and trade professionals jump on the personal and business branding bandwagon NOW - they can control their own destiny and grow their business or reputation.

Is your construction company in the dumps? What are you doing in your marketing to help you get that new contract in the area? Are you really doing everything you can and relying on every resource that you can? Are you expanding your network? Looking for joint ventures? Looking to consult other companies across the globe? Looking to be the first to know about new funding, local development and government regulations?

Here are some things that I told the class to do:
Secure your name online. Sounds obvious, but I can count on a few hands how many local Orlando businesses know what is said about their company online and I can count on 2 of those hands the companies that know what to do with what they see. If all you do is use Google, do a few searches, then you have done more than 95% of your competition in the small business market (*NOTE - that 95% data is make believe, I performed no "real" survey but it's pretty damn close).

Write down 3 things that you can teach someone right now, without having to do any research, but the skills you have in that big ol brain of yours. (Print this and write them down)
1.
2.
3.

Write down 2 things that you can do better than anyone you know. This one was a shocker. Even if you do not know everything about a field, you probably know more than someone who is just getting started, or you may have a secret that even the pro's and experts can utilize. (If you printed this in the last step, then this should be easy!)
1.
2.

I asked the group to write down who their hero is. Then I asked why. This will tell you a lot about the qualities that you CAN see in yourself with the right refinement. (No excuses, your printer is awaiting your print job!)
Your hero is:
He is your hero because:

Lastly, I asked them to decide where they want to be in 6 months from now as well as 1 year from now. The point was to start acting, talking and educating yourself like you are that person right now. Why wait till someone gives you permission to be the best insurance salesman? Why can't you learn from the best and implement innovative strategies now and close more business and be the best you can be today? (Again, you should print this article - its not too tough - and write your answers down)
6 months from now I will be:
1 year from now I will be:

Here is a quick recap of some things that I learned from this group of non-20-something, non marketing, non creative and poverty stricken local Orlando folk, who have never heard of a blog or Twitter before last Thursday:

• I am creating an online portfolio of every construction site I have worked on. I always take a picture at the end and at the beginning. I have pictures of tools, machines, cranes and people.
• I subscribed to every blog on AllTop that had to do with Cooking and Food. I am commenting and hopefully will learn from them and bring that knowledge into a job interview with a local catering company.
• I used that Google Reader thing and got channels for Google News about Orlando Hotels.

That is awesome!

How can you be the Rock Star of your niche?

-Greg Rollett

Leveraging SEO to Find New Clients - Research Phase

After the interview with Jun Loayza for Awesome Bloggers a few days ago, I have received a few emails on how to best use SEO to get new clients. In the interview Jun asked how I was able to land clients like Miller Lite, Coca-Cola, Disney and others at such a young age. My answer was through organic traffic to my blog. SEO was one of the first things I learned in Internet Marketing and is still my number one outlet for client work, general knowledge and traffic.

I am no SEO Super Ninja, but a few Rock Star SEO moves and you can increase your visibility in the SERPS (search engine results pages) quite rapidly. I hope this helps and please keep the questions and comments coming. The Rock Star Course we are designing is geared towards helping you guys out and knowing what you want to know is only going to make the course better and you stronger. Here is part 1:

Research and Niche Grabbing

This is everyone's favorite part of the process. I hear the moaning and groaning as I am typing this. When do we get to the fun part? When do the clients start calling my cell phone? The thing is they will never call your phone if you do not position yourself to be seen by the people doing the looking. I like to breakdown the research phase into 3 parts:

• What are you good at?
• Are people looking for that?
• What is the competition like?

What are you good at?

When I started out I wanted to be the young marketing guy that had ideas, thoughts and vision that my peers and even other ad agencies and marketing firms didn't have. I got involved in some Gen-Y circles (Brazen Careerist, YPulse, MobileYouth, YPBlogs, etc). I was also working as a Social Media Specialist way before that job was cool for 20something's that wanted to get paid to blog and Twitter.

Were people looking for this?

So at this point I needed to know if people were actually searching for a young marketer. They weren't. Instead of being disappointed I looked for offshoots of this to find keywords that agencies and brands were looking for. After a not so formal process, my website was titled" Gen-Y, Youth Culture and Social Media Marketing by Greg Rollett." Wow, that sounds boring as hell, but do you know what?

Google #4 - Gen-Y Marketing Blog
Google #3, 4 and 8 for Youth Culture Marketing
Google #7 for Gen-Y Social Media
Google #9 for Youth Social Media

(note - these results may vary - Google likes to do that and I also just changed the theme of this blog to reflect the new Rock Star Life angle so I will lose some Googleness but have now positioned myself for my next move to get customers instead of clients!)

Next thing to note. These are not heavily searched terms. How do I know this? Google tells me. By using their free Adwords Keyword Tool you can get some awesome data (*NOT 100% accurate*) that can tell you how many times a keyphrase is searched every month, give you different variations of that term (the Long Tail) and some other key stats depending how in depth you want to get.

Here is a screenshot for the term "youth culture marketing"

(Click image to enlarge)

What is the competition like?

The last thing I look for when choosing my keywords and niches is the competition in the field. There are obvious terms like "marketing" that no matter how good of an SEO Rock Star you are, you are going to need a great deal of outside factors and a good time line to break into those pages. So we need to break the terms down further (again, the Long Tail) to lower the competition. How do you know the competition?

Google tells us!

Do a search for the keyphrase that you are considering, for this example I will again use "youth culture marketing." Google tells me that there are 1,980,000 web pages that are indexed for that term. That is a heck of a lot of competition, but not nearly as much as "marketing" which would pit you up against 608,000,000. I'll take my chances on the 2 million. You find this number on the top right side of the where Google says:

Results 1 - 10 of about 773,000 for youth culture marketing. (0.21 seconds)

Putting this together:

Now that I am working in more than 1 niche here is what I look for when expanding into a new one using the 3 principles above:

1. I have to know something awesome about the niche that others do not or at least have a quality that makes me better than everyone else
2. Multiple long tail keyphrases that have at least 500 searches per month
3. Competition of less than 500,000

Why did you choose that?

Knowing something about your niche gives you something to care about when you are working on it. I have tried many sites and failed due to not knowing anything about the product or industry. I have had eCommerce sites that sold bird feeders and when customers asked a question, I had to Google it and get the same content as the people asking the questions were getting. If you are trying to package in design offerings to your text message marketing campaign, you better be prepared to talk about design and not rely on a partner. This is imperative when picking your site topics and keywords - just because it gets traffic, DOES NOT mean its the right traffic for you!

The second point should be obvious. You need to know that real people are searching for your keyterm and they do so consistently. 500 is just a number that I like to use however its just a benchmark for me. Locally we have clients that rank well for terms that get 10-20 searches a month, yet the return on a lead is so massive it makes sense in their business. Do what makes sense to know and know how many visitors it takes to find the one that is going to convert.

The last one is something that I have been refining and keep refining and different folks will tell you different things. Here is my theory - the less competition the more opportunity. The more content you produce for those specific keywords the more visible you become. Big fish, small pond concept. With 500,000 or less competitive web pages I know that I can write some great copy, titles, get a few links, write a few guest posts and throw up some videos and get close in a very short period of time. In some niches with less than 100,000 pages, I have seen results on page 1 in Google in 24 hours.

Homework

I hope this helps in selecting your niche and doing some research, but to make it even easier, here is a link to a Google Spreadsheet Doc with a worksheet to get started in the research phase. This is what I use in my business and for my clients and WILL get you better search results.

-Greg Rollett

Why I Love Infomercials But Hate The Telephone

I have a fear of the phone.
Something about the person that picks up not wanting to talk to me and hanging up all pissed off just bothers and scares me. Cold calling is the worst. When I was doing real estate investment with Jen a few years back, the process was pretty simple and highly effective.

Find people that owed a ton of back taxes in a specific undeveloped area, research them, cold call and ask them to sell to us so that we could flip the property and make some cash.

I couldn't do it. I saw the money piling up in my imaginative back account, the house that we could buy, the boat that I would be sipping Corona's on while wakeboarding on a Tuesday and the freedom that came with the real estate boom of the early 2000's. But I still couldn't do it.

The phone scares the shit out of me. Still to this day I will shoot an email 100% of the time over making a phone call, but I have gotten better. I have gotten better because I have been studying and understanding people and relationships. Most people want to talk, they want to learn and they want to better themselves. If you can solve these conditions for them, you will have a much better chance of getting them to open up, become vulnerable and make a sale - or at least make a legitimate pitch. However I find it to be a very unpleasant approach to a first impression.

Why Infomercials Rock

The exact opposite of direct selling via the phone is direct selling via an infomercial or direct response tv ad. Here you have a scripted salesman, sales crew, whatever - talking into a camera, using sales copy and client testimonials to tell a story about their product, the history behind its design and success and what you can achieve if you act now! My favorite part is the opt-in. If you don't like the infomercial - you change channels.

And I love Saturday morning and super late night infomercials. Hearing the way these people talk to the camera, the way they invite you into their mindframe and the way they get you into their buying cycle is absolutely priceless. But why do you get sucked into the 30 minutes of madness and get hooked?

It is results oriented selling.

These people are selling on the premise that by buying their shit, you will have a better life in someway. Here is the breakdown:

• I don't care how many flavors it has - only that it will quench my thirst or make my date happy at the movies
• It doesn't matter how many exercises I can do - only that I will have Marine like abs in 30 days
• House moms care about getting the stain out at all costs
• I will be rich in 30 days

When you are creating your marketing plan, focus on the end results of what you want your client, customer, whatever to see. The bells and whistles are cool, but at the end of the day they want results. If you can show them results, they will continue to buy, continue to do the promotion for you and continue to give you kick ass testimonials to keep making cheezy infomercials.

We are going to be breaking down some infomercials, internet marketing sales letters and other sales tactics in the next few days because what marketing boils down to is producing more sales through interaction at some level with the product and the consumer. While some people will claim that these long form methods of selling are old school, annoying or do not work - I can tell you that they still 100% work, but (you knew there was a but coming) you will have to keep coming back to find out why these damn things are so infectious.

Today's homework

Recall the last infomercial that had you hooked and ready to pull out your Amex. In a sentence or 2, explain why it had you hooked. Write your responses in the comments and we will explore and break down the best infomercials you kids can bring into the conversation. Looking forward to seeing your insight.

-Greg Rollett

P.S. Yes, I am working on a product launch. More on that to come. It has to do with Rock Stars, Personal Branding and Selling, but mostly its about, "Really Cool Lifestyle Design." I am pretty excited about it, although it may shift the focus of this site, like I always do every 6 months or so, to more of a lifestlye design or business design or marketing design - post themes. Hopefully it will add value and steps and most importantly action to help you get the results you want for yourself, your company and your life.

The Rock Star Philosophy

(photo by Daniesq - ps that's not my band they just looked like they are having fun!)

A few months ago I talked about instilling the Rock Star Lifestyle into as many other people as possible. Over that time frame I have been going back and forth on how to expand this notion and make it

• possible
• repeatable
• teachable
• profitable

I don't have all the answers but know that giving others the confidence, poise and performance measures to live like a Rock Star is something that is very important for personal development and lifestyle design to create successful career paths. Living like a rock star does not mean you have to work for the man (or the machine in the case of a major label), nor does it mean that you have to live freely, location independent or on your own.

Crappy nights in Georgia Still Need Rocking

Living like a Rock Star boils down to having the ability to perform at your highest capacity, no matter the place, no matter the time, no matter the crowd. One of the last shows that I played with my band (StumpP, not the recent retired but called into action Sneakers) was in a small town in Georgia, after an 8 hour drive, where we played for 15 people, including the staff. By all means it had the making of the worst night of our career together, but we lived like true rock stars and tore the roof off the building, sold CD's to every single person in the room, doubled our pay out and left feeling like we tore up a sold out show! That was living like a rock star.

The fundamentals behind living the Rock Star life are by no means set in stone and as I start working on the outline for the course we'll be rolling out, things are bound to change. What I've come up with are 3 distint areas that are the focus behind the rock star lifestyle:

• Skills Assessment & Career Development
• Lifestyle Design
• Building Confidence and Humility

Each piece has differnt influencers that lead to differnt outcomes, with the end goal being able to perform to your highest ability day in and day out. The key piece of the entire course will be the way in which you take action to achive the lifestyle you wish to live. You can talk about change all you want, but at the end of the day your actions will determine your happiness and outlook.

Information for Action's Sake

We all suffer from information overload. RSS feeds, Twitter, Facebook updates, mobile phones that ping your emails, tv, news, papers, webinars, conferences - whatever and however you take in the information, you get so much of it that it makes it hard to digest and turn that information into usable actions.

Even those golden blog posts, "5 Ways To Do Whatever," are usually written without much focus on actionable items that you can perform right now. Think about all the b/s you read every afternoon/morning and how much of that impacts your day-to-day life. I can count on my hands the number of writers that inspire me to take action and make a difference in my life. That equals a lot of wasted time and resources.

In order to live the rock star life you need to focus on core actions that have an impact. In my own life I started slowly, made a plan and started finding the pieces that made the puzzle look like the picture on the box. Some examples may be:

• Start a band, play shows, record and album, sell the album, promote the album, repeat.
• See a problem, create a solution, recruit others, enforce the solution.
• Discover a skill, educate, network, create authority, address authority, work in the field, own the field.

________________________________________________________

Well, it's Friday, and Jun Loayza just let me know our video from his awesome bloggers series is live. That took place on Wednesday of this week and really motivated me to start getting this Rock Star Lifestyle thing going and moving it into motion.

The video is embedded below and you can learn more here. Tomorrow (Saturday) we will be co-hosting Start-Up Saturdays at 2pm EST and 11am PCT. I am super stoked for that. The topic is on company money, funding and all that good stuff that has to do with paying the bills and making your start-up tick.



I know the posts haven't been as fluid lately, but its all part of being that Gen-Y guy trying to find his direction and all that jazz (plus we have some clients who rock hard as well and want this enthusiasm to carry over into their business). In the mean time, catch me posted living like a rock star, helping the community and still not saying NO to any project that looks fun and challenging.

-Greg