by: AskPat 263 Episode Transcript
Pat Flynn: What's up, everybody? Pat Flynn here, and welcome to Episode 263 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today. Before we get to today's question from Joshua, however, I do want to thank today's sponsor, which is Lynda.com.
That's Lynda.com. What is it? It is the best site that is used by millions of people around the world, because there are over 3,000 courses to help you learn on anything, from topics like web development to photography. I have used a couple photography courses myself. Visual design. Business. I'm using also right now to learn some more techniques for Photoshop. I just checked it out and plugged in Photoshop in the search results here in Lynda, and there are over 300 results, everything ranging from how to create icons to training modules. All types of levels, and these videos are super high quality too. They are not just little Youtube videos. They are studio quality to help you get what you need to make improvements in your business, in your life. To help you moving forward here in 2015. You can start your 10-day free trial today by going to Lynda.com/askpat. That is Lynda.com/askpat. Check it out.
All right, now here's today's question from Josh.
Josh: What is up, Pat? This is Josh. I'm JoshuaPCornwell.com. I'm another entrepreneur, teaching other like-minded individuals how to create residual income. My question for you is, since my website is very young, around six, seven months old, where should I devote majority of my time into growing my business? I have zero, no traffic right now. Zero audience. Should I devote majority of my time into creating a lot of keyword-rich articles and dominate the search engines? Or should I use avenues such as video marketing and gain traffic from those as well? Like I said, I just need a better understanding of where I should devote the majority of my time. What can I do to make this process a lot more efficient? I'm in this for the long haul. I know it's going to take a long time, but I want to speed it up as much as possible. Any response to you could be great. Please be a little bit more specific than saying, “Create great content.” If you could be more specific than that, that would be awesome. I just want to say thank you so much for everything you've done, and I hope to hear back from you soon.
Pat Flynn: Hey, Josh. Thank you so much for the question today. I want to be completely honest and upfront with you, because I want to help you. I know a lot of people who are out there who can also relate to you, because they are in the same space as we are in. We are here to help other entrepreneurs create residual income, passive income, and help them achieve financial freedom, which is what's mentioned on the front side of your page. I think that's great. You have, over the past six, seven months, have very little traffic. Very little income, obviously, because there's little traffic coming from that.
So, where do you start? Where do you put your time? I will say that after visiting your site, I knew right away what the answer should be. That is because I know a lot of people, who after listening to what I do and how I've been able to build an income online and how I've been able to help other entrepreneurs, they want to do the same thing. I think that's great. It would be hypocritical of me to say, “You've got to get out of this space. There is no room for anybody to help other entrepreneurs, because I'm already here.” No! I wasn't the first one to get into this space, but I did come in with a specific position that was different from everybody else, and that's what you need to do more than anything. That is going to give you the most bang for your buck, Joshua. If you want to come in here and deliver amazing content, and I'm going to you specifics in just a second … If you want to come in here and be successful with the website that you've obviously spent time to create … it's well-designed, and I see what you're doing here, and it's great, but there's a lot of room for improvement.
It would start with positioning yourself different from other people who are doing this already. I can tell that you are taking a lot of inspiration from me. I appreciate that. I'm honored by that. I'm flattered by it. However, it is so close to how I'm approaching things, and I'm not saying don't do it like me, but do it your way. In a different way or else you will always be that second in line sort of thing. That is the approach you need to take and why it's so important to find that position. What is going to make Joshua P. Cornwell different from everybody else out there talking about how to build passive income streams? How to build a blog. How to be an entrepreneur online. The best way you can do that, and this has been repeated time and time again in the history of online business and people teaching online business, is you have to be successful with your own online businesses first. Ninety-nine percent of the time, that has to be the case. There are a few exceptions to the rule for people who have been able to help other entrepreneurs without being entrepreneurs themselves first. That is totally fine, but the majority of people who are succeeding in the space that we are in, Joshua, are people who have built successful businesses or who are also currently building successful businesses outside of this business of helping people start their own businesses. It is really important that you grasp this idea, and I know everybody else out there listening would agree with me, because if you are going to learn how to do something, you want to learn from somebody who has done it before. Maybe you have, Joshua, but I just don't see that proof on your website. That reality. A website that I can go to that I can see that you've started and have successfully done yourself.
I have seen a couple articles and sprinkles of that in some niche sites that you've built that have earned a couple hundred dollars. That is great. I want more of that, and I want to see bigger numbers, which means you're going to have to work even harder and put more time, not into JoshuaPCornwell.com, but into these other sites and then try to develop your own voice and techniques and strategies that are going to help other people too. Right now, if I'm a brand new visitor coming to your site, I go there and I see this Getting Started button now, which is great. I recommend everybody do that, and I'm glad you adopted that. Totally legit. Good start. Then I come down here and I see testimonials. Okay, but it doesn't give me exactly … I just see a guy named Julio de Santos, an entrepreneur saying how great you are, which I'm sure you're great, but I want proof. I want you or Julio to show me how.
Then, all throughout the homepage I see, okay, take one of the residual income streams and make money today. If I'm anybody who is a common person online, I immediately, that red flag goes up. Those sirens go off saying, “Okay, there's something fishy going on here because I know, typically, you can't just flip a switch and make money today.” I think you're going to have to change some of that language on this site. Again, even before you work on this site, you want to work on your case studies. On your reports. On the proof. On businesses, real businesses that are successful that you can then pull articles from and that will be different from everybody else out there. I have read 10 of your articles, and a lot of them I can see are very inspired by what I've put together. My resource page. You have the exact same disclaimer on there. My affiliate marketing page, it's the same exact structure, just a little bit of different language. Again, I'm flattered by that. I'm not bothered by that at all, except for the fact that you're not putting your own voice into it, and there is no proof of what you have to offer. There is just stuff that's rehashed from other people as well.
I beg of you, please, Joshua, so you're not wasting your time, I'm not saying you should stop and scrap this. I'm saying you should put time and effort into building these residual income streams that you claim you can build for other people as well. When you can do this, and if you can do it repeatedly, maybe you have a structure or formula that comes out of that that you can then share. Then maybe that becomes a product or a class down the road, or a book, even. There are a lot of opportunities that can come out of that by first doing it yourself. If you are doing it yourself, or when you do do it yourself, sharing that and being totally open and honest about all of that. I think that is what has helped me grow so fast, is because I'm using my own examples. My own experiments. I see, like I said before, you're starting to do some of that, which is great. Those are the articles that people comment on and share and get interested in, because it's real-life stuff. You are sharing information that is helpful, but it's helpful that … it's stuff that everybody else has already said. What thing new can you bring to the table?
That is where I would start, Joshua. I hope that resonates with you. I'm not trying to be mean. I'm not trying to pick on you. This is a message for everybody out there. If you want somebody to learn from you, then you have to prove that you're a person they can learn from. That you've done it before. It is like going to a gym and learning how to lift weights from somebody who has super scrawny arms. Are you really going to believe them? No. Unless they were to then all of a sudden lift 300 pounds with their scrawny arms. Then, whoa, okay. You've just proven to me. Now I'm going to pay attention and listen. I'm not saying you have scrawny arms or anything like that. I hope you understand the analogy here, but I want you to create something that allows you to … and gives you permission. I'm not saying you don't have permission, but kind of am saying that, because … and again, I'm not picking on you, but what makes you think somebody's going to want to learn from you if there is no really thing here that's different from what everybody else is saying out there?
Joshua, I really hope this helps you. I hope it becomes a light bulb in your head. I hope it doesn't knock you down, because if I was in your position, I would want somebody to tell me the same thing. For those of you listening out there, if you have something to add to this, go ahead and use the hashtag #AskPat263 in Twitter. I want to know what you think. I want to know if you believe in what I say, or if I'm totally coming at this at the wrong angle. I want to know what you think, and I'm sure Joshua would want to know that too. I think you're off to a great start, and you've given yourself a great platform to potentially talk about these things that you're going to create. Do that. That is my challenge to you, Joshua. That is the specific thing I want you to do. Create passive income and residual income streams for yourself. Use your own businesses and residual income streams that you create as potential content that you can write about and video about and all that stuff. Then, you can get into the keyword stuff and the video marketing stuff, which will help, but you can be a master at that now. But when people come to your site and see that you have no proof, then it would be all worthless. I would start with your own success stories, and then you can have other people be inspired by that and create success stories thanks to you after that.
Joshua, thank you so much for the question. I really appreciate it. If you want to follow up and have a chat on Twitter, whatever, about this, let me know. Again, hashtag, for everybody out there, #AskPat263, and I'm here to help. I know exactly where you were, because I was there before. An AskPat t-shirt is going to be headed your way for having your question featured here on the show. Thank you so much, Joshua. For everybody else out there listening, if you have a question you'd like potentially featured here on the show, just head on over to AskPat.com. You can ask right there on that page thanks to the Speakpipe.com widget.
I also want to thank today's sponsor, which is Lynda.com, which, the free trial is just such a good deal. There is no reason not to check it out so go ahead and check it out. Lynda.com/askpat. You get unlimited access to every course on Lynda. Check it out. Type in some keywords on things you're trying to learn or figure out. You are going to see courses related to it, and you're going to see how great quality they are. Plus they have an Android mobile phone app, and also an iPhone app. Oh, man, you've got to check it out. Again, Lynda.com/askpat. Thank you so much.
As always, I'd like to end with a quote. Today's quote comes from May Sarton. That quote is, “We have to dare to be ourselves, however frightening or strange that self may prove to be.” Cheers. Take care, everybody and I'll see you in the next episode of AskPat.