Recently, I was asked on this on Twitter:
“Yo Ben random question, do you think it’s still feasible for someone to get into a crazy hot niche like email marketing / direct response services and actually go and ramp up to like $30k/m within a year if you’re completely new with no connections and experience ?”
My response:
1. Email is very trendy – where it’s big and cool for a few years, then the next bright shiny object tool comes along and everyone grifts to that and says email is dead, nobody reads emails, email is worthless, none of them get delivered… the usual nonsense.
Offering email services is just a bubble right now in my opinion, ripe for the popping.
Just like it’s done multiple times in the last almost 30 years.
2. If you want to sell direct response-related services, email or anything else, best way to do it is you go find a niche you’re passionate about (outside of teaching anything marketing-related, which you’re not ready for anyway if you’re asking this), grow your own list, sell it offers with email and sales copy you write, create, while working a 9-5 job to pay your bills.
Takes very little start up investment to do this.
All you really require is an email platform. If you use our BerserkerMail platform we will even host your opt-in page. What that means is, technically you don’t even really need a website at first. Just send people to your opt-in page hosted on our services and you’ll grow that righteous list of yours.
I realize nobody wants to hear any of this advice about getting a job.
They want the $100k business right out of school.
I mean, who doesn’t?
I was just reading about a poll saying zoomers all plan to retire at 56 years old or something.
Good luck with that, boys & ghouls..
Something else:
Worst thing you can do is market any kind of service when your broke, needy, and/or hungry.
Dig ditches or work at McDonalds (everyone’s hiring right now).
Or, better yet, find a helpdesk job for a SaaS company.
You’ll probably learn more about service and customer psychology doing that than probably any other method, and very quickly, and while getting paid. Frankly, if I was just getting started I’d get such a job. And thenI’d work my direct response business on the side, network my gluteous assimus off, make deals, and avoid clients until I had a business selling my own offers making enough where I don’t need clients.
At that point clients are optional.
Even better:
At that point if you still want to grace customers with your presence, you’ll come from a position of strength, expertise, and knowledge, and can charge far more, get far more compliance, and have far less headaches. Of course, if you do build your own thing and if you do become your own client, you will probably come to the conclusion I did many years ago:
Why bother with clients?
Why give other businesses the best of what you have to offer and the bulk of your time and the depths of your creativity & passion & knowledge building a lifestyle for that client and his family, when you can keep all the sales for yourself, control your own destiny, and create a lifestyle for yourself and your own family?
I say all this as someone who hates dealing with clients.
So I am obviously biased.
There are people who genuinely like dealing with clients.
And God bless ’em, someone has to I suppose.
But even if you want to lick client boots for the rest of your life, I’d still recommend getting a job, working your own direct response biz on the side selling your own offers to your own list first before finding any clients, relying on any clients, putting up with any clients.
All right ’nuff said.
Only other thing I will say about this is, when one is ready with a list and an offer and an eagerness to grow, Email Players newsletter could be the right move.
But until then?
Best stay way.
Otherwise, here is the link:
Ben Settle
