Vital New AdWords Features for 2014

Mel,   Google made something like 1000 changes to AdWords this year. It would take a crew of analysts just to keep up with all that. The legendary fighter Bruce Lee devastated his opponent with 3 deft moves. NOT by obsessing about 1001 nifty little tricks! That’s how I approach marketing, which is why you do NOT hear from me about every last wrinkle and tweak. Obsessing about every update is anti-80/20. Besides, if you build your campaigns properly, most of this stuff doesn’t hugely affect you. However some of those changes ARE powerful and very useful. Which ones? WordStream is hosting a webinar on Tuesday November 19. Larry Kim and team will cover the Top 10 AdWords Features of this year - just the most valuable and important updates that you need to know about, including: * Key changes to AdWords ranking algorithms * New and retired tools (Why did they do away with the Keyword tool? What’s good about the new Planner tool? You’ll find out.) * New AdWords metrics and why they matter * Hidden changes that you probably missed! Date: Tuesday, November 19, 2013 Time: 1:00 PM EST Register Here Perry Marshall             ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

Do what you love & the money will follow?

I am now taking applications for Roundtable 2014 - seats limited, first come first served   Mel,   'Do what you love and the money will follow.' You’ve heard this many times. Is it true? Is it true that if you pursue your passion, money will pursue you? NO. Not in my experience. This is what I’ve found: “Find the thing you love in the current challenge, then your passion will attract success.” Case in point: If I was committed to “doing what I love” I would have never gone into marketing in the first place. My first six years of failed attempts in sales were misery. But I knew if I merely did what I loved - designing audio gear - I’d have few other options in my life, cuz those guys don’t make much money. I knew I HAD to master sales and marketing. I knew sales, not engineering, is the tiny hinge that swings the big doors. Eventually I found a way to sell… in a way that matched who I am. Today I have a FUN job. I meet incredibly interesting people and work on amazing projects. I just had to run through the gauntlet first and get myself sorted. In my first sales job, very little that we sold seemed interesting. (That mistake could have been avoided, by the way…) However one product line, our networking gear, really grabbed a customers’ attention one day. I was hungry so that made a HUGE impression on me. I went down the rabbit hole. Eventually I became fascinated with those 1’s and 0’s - despite NOT liking them in college, where I actually failed my first “digital systems” class. (It was SO boring. Dreadful.) Eventually I even wrote an Ethernet book. Which opened up all kinds of other fascinating things, including a $250,000 client. But first I had to discover what was so cool about it. Cuz until you get beyond a certain point… you can’t possibly know! My buddy John Fancher, truth be told, would actually prefer to be a poet and rock star. He's a fantastic writer, and on stage he can give Bob Dylan a run for his money. But right now the money is in email copywriting. He's channeled his poetry and his rock & roll passion into something the world wants and needs. Almost any job can be fun and fascinating, *once you discover how you and that business fit together.* Something you love is lurking in there. A door to your future is lurking in there. Where is it? The dinero is on the other side of that answer. Perry Marshall             ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

Important change to Google’s ad rank formula

Psyche your business for a kick-ass 2014 - 4-Man Intensive December 16-17 http://www.perrymarshall.com/roundtable/4-man-intensive/   Mel,   This matters, so pay attention. Google has hung a big juicy carrot at the end of the AdWords stick. For years Google’s formula has been: Position = Quality Score x Bid Price. Where two thirds of Quality Score is Click Thru Rate. What’s new is, Ad Extensions are the tie breakers. If two ads are close, the winner is going to be the one that makes best use of Ad Extensions. None of this matters if people can’t see your ad extensions. They only see those in the premium space, the top three positions in AdWords. This means - if you’re not grooming your ads for the top 3 spots, you’re not in the game. Ad Extensions push the organic results lower on the page and drive more revenue for Google. This means you need to be testing your extensions and getting enough exposure to appear in the top 3. Otherwise, Google doesn’t consider you a player.   Everything Google does makes sense if you understand 80/20. 80/20 says: Reward your best advertisers by offering even more tempting carrots on the end of the stick. This article by Wordstream expounds on the implications of this: http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2013/10/24/adwords-ad-rank-algorithm My opinion on what Google is doing: The success rate of Google advertisers used to be 80/20; now it’s 90/10. 10% of the advertisers get 90% of the clicks. Google is less and less interested in the positions running down the right side and more interested in rewarding the top 3 spots. They are even experimenting with large banner ads at the top of search results. What this tells me is, Google is ALL about money now. They are not about mission. They are not about sticking to their original objectives or identity. They are whoring themselves out to the almighty dollar. Which of course is what public companies always do. Now they have every right to do this, but I also believe this is hurting them. It is hurting them in the long run because a Google search offers you fewer interesting options than it used to. Many times there are no results on the right side, only the top 3. They are just driving you towards the top players. I don’t think many people appreciate how many businesses and industries now exist solely because a very large search engine exists that sells advertising. The very phenomenon of AdWords and things like it is the highest kind of economic alchemy. It is the very thing that makes recessions go away and creates economic booms. What made Google great originally was the diversity of offerings. Insiders tell me, for example, that when Google started slapping down advertisers with Quality Score stipulations, their SEARCH volume started going down! In other words people were subconsciously expecting to find less interesting things to buy on Google. This degradation happens to all large companies, unfortunately. Law of large numbers. But anyway, regardless of my idealism or the “should be” world, the IS world is that you gotta be one of the top 10% players, or you ain’t playing. This means *winners win bigger* and losers lose faster. If you’re on top of your game, you get A HUGE AMOUNT OF TRAFFIC. I just talked to a guy the other day who sells a particular kind of medical device. He’s top dog in his market and he’s just minting money. I’m telling you, being #1 in your market has never been more profitable. Recession or not. Dominate your market. And sleep with one eye open. Perry Marshall Dramatically improve your business in 48 hours. December 16-17 in Chicago http://www.perrymarshall.com/roundtable/4-man-intensive/           ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

Reduce your AdWords Stupidity Tax + Win Some Dinero

Mel,   25% of your Google AdWords spend is sheer waste. You might as well bake a casserole for dinner tonight, then dump it in your back yard so the squirrels can eat it. That will certainly cost you less money & sweat than whatever most folks are paying in AdWords stupidity tax.   Where exactly is the waste? Wordstream’s grader will tell you, AND you can enter a contest simply by feeding your best insights back to Wordstream.   You can win $25K. It will come to you in the form of $2,000/month AdWords budget for all of 2014.   Enter here:   http://www.wordstream.com/gradeandgetpaid   Perry           ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

#1 Source of Pain & Frustration Laid Bare. October 24

Case Study of a Breakthrough USP: 10am Eastern http://www.perrymarshall.com/training/usp/   Mel,   One of the greatest delusions - one of the deepest sources of pain and frustration in your business is... Thinking you have a GREAT Unique Selling Proposition, when your USP is actually bland and mediocre. If your USP does not cause people to bolt upright and take notice… If they don't stop and pay attention, and eagerly pull out their credit card and buy from you… You do NOT have a killer USP. A weak USP is like a needle that drains blood out of your arm 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You feel feeble and lethargic and don't know why. Symptom of a weak USP: Traffic keeps getting more and more expensive and the more money you throw at it, the worse the problem seems to become. Many times your "traffic problem" is really a USP problem. You'll be amazed at what happens when you solve the problem at the core - how EVERYTHING in your business turns around. It's like shaving with a brand new fresh blade, it cuts through with effortless ease. That's why on Thursday October 24 at 10am Eastern Time, Bryan and I are doing a case study on "The Killer Advantages of a Rock-Solid USP." Register Here Now: http://www.perrymarshall.com/training/usp/ Perry Marshall             ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

Roundtable Chronicles for October 6, 2013

Mel, This week I hosted my Roundtable meetings in Chicago. Roundtable is Planet Perry's Fight Club for entrepreneurs, where we all pound the slag off each others' ideas. Mr. D had his turn on the hot seat. Mr. D is the marketing director of a high-end design school. College tuition is $60,000 per year and he's got 100 students. It's an organization of A Players and he has surpassed all his direct competitors. He's at the top of the heap. On a consulting call I used the 80/20 Curve to show him how much money he's still leaving on the table. "Go to www.8020curve.com. Go to "Rack the Shotgun" and enter 100 members total, 100 responded and "Value of output" is 60,000. The tool spits out a graph, like this: "The red part, that's the dinero you're getting now - about $6 million a year. A small, boutique niche business." I said, "Everything between the upper curve and the red, that's money that your customers are fully capable of spending, that you are NOT getting. But they WOULD spend it, IF you offered them something that thoroughly scratched their educational itch in every possible way." He says, "So you're saying I've got 20 customers who would spend $240,000 or more on tuition, and $60,000 isn't enough??? We're already at the top of our market." "Yes," I said. "They would spend it if you put the right upgrade offer in front of them. They not only have the money but also the desire. It's practically a law of physics." He asks, "This is also showing me that the #1 family would pay $3.169 million per year. How is that even remotely possible?" I say, "Remember German Chancellor who wanted to send his daughter, but you turned him down because you couldn't guarantee absolute security and protection from the paparazzi?" "Yeah, I remember that." "Could his family afford to pay you $3 million a year if you give her ALL the perks that come with your school AND completely assured her dad that his security concerns would be met?" "Absolutely they could." "Plus you could easily afford the extra measures you'd have to take. And then how 'bout the arab sheiks who send their kids to your school? If you guaranteed to safely land their kid in Harvard's grad program, would they pay a million dollars?" "Yep. A handful of our parents absolutely would do that." That wasn't all. Matt Gillogly jumped in. "You know what you need? You need a FOUNDATION." "Why do I need a foundation?" "Because parents BELIEVE in your school's mission. Even people who wouldn't pay a penny more than the standard tuition, would still donate a million dollars to the school. Why? So underprivileged kids can go too. Or they might donate $3 million so they can have their name on a brand new arts building. That's the easiest way to get that $3 million." Matt continued: "You've got parents who would be *delighted* to be the chairman of your foundation, fly around in their corporate jets and solicit other, multi-million dollar donors." In Planet Perry we teach the Power Triangle of Traffic, Conversion, Economics, with 80/20 in the center. The conversation you just eavesdropped on is the ECONOMICS conversation. Certainly in our Mastermind Group you can get a bunch of geniuses to critique your landing page. But we also craft HUGE plans that grow into multi-million dollar corporations. Including the details that make them work. We also maintain confidentiality, which is why the details of this story have been tweaked. The principle remains unchanged. Do YOU crave an informal Board of Directors, men and women who will challenge you to the highest levels of excellence, call you out on your BS, and support you through your trials? I would not be caught dead *not* in a high level mastermind group. I'm taking applications for Roundtable 2014. Tuition is 19.9K, with extra options for those who wish to work more closely with me. First meeting at the end of January in Orlando. To submit your application, contact matt@perrymarshall.com. Perry Marshall           ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here

Gems from Richard Koch's brand new book "The 80/20 Manager"

Mel,   Richard Koch's brand new book The 80/20 Manager is just out this week. Some juicy sound bytes: On Bill Bain, founder of Bain Consulting: "It probably didn't take Bill Bain long to work out this ingenious formula ad then to build his firm around it. But the value created for Bain & Company - and usually for the client, too - was astronomical. Bill spent his time on what he was uniquely qualified to do. His output bore no relation to the time or effort he inputted. But if Bill had been less lazy, I doubt that he ever would have dreamed up this amazing wealth-creation system. Also, I believe his lack of an MBA helped tremendously." "Surely it is significant that the two most creative and influential  management consultants of the last sixty years were indubitably the laziest too." Quoting Bertrand Russell: "Work is of two kinds: first, altering the position of matter at or near the earth's surface relatively to other such matter; second, telling other people to do so. The first one is unpleasant and ill paid; the second is pleasant and highly paid.” On Execution: "All strategic managers value thought above action." On Innovation: "If you have a hunch as to how your industry could be reconstructed, if you know what it lacks that a totally different approach might bring, and if you have an inkling of what that approach might be, you should pursue it… because you might well be on your way to founding the next Google or Facebook." On Simplification: "The greatest challenge for any business based on product innovation is how to simplify is products and in the process make them more affordable and easier to use. Product simplification is hard to achieve but it is a sure route to domination and expansion." On Laziness: "Laziness is the road to progress, but only when it is allied to intelligent thought and high ambition." On Decisive Leadership: "There's a true story about a handful of soldiers who got lost on a training exercise in the Alps when they became detached from their battalion. The snow disoriented them. Every peak looked the same.   They argued about which way to go. Light was fading. They were cold, hungry and afraid. They had little chance of surviving the night in the freezing temperatures. Then a miracle happened. One of them found a map in the lining of his kitbag. He figured out the route, pointed the way, and they all marched briskly back to base. It was only when they were warm and well fed that the soldier looked closer at the map. It was of the Pyrenees, hundreds of miles away." Get your copy of The 80/20 Manager on Amazon Perry Marshall             ***NOTE: Please do not reply directly to this email, instead go to http://support.perrymarshall.com Free Video We manage our emails with Infusion. This Guide and Video explain my secret marketing sauce. If you no longer wish to receive our emails, click the link below:  Update subscriber options Perry S. Marshall & Assoc 159 N. Marion Street #295 Oak Park, Illinois 60301 United States (312) 386-7459   Having trouble viewing this email? Click here