AP 0598: I’ve Spent Too Much Money on Courses. Where Do I Find Partners for Joint Ventures?

AskPat 598 Episode Transcript

Pat Flynn: Hey, what's up everybody. Pat Flynn here and welcome to Episode 598 of AskPat. Thank you so much for joining me today. As always I'm here to help you by answering your online business questions, five days a week. WE have a great question today from Bob. But before we get to Bob's question, I do want to thank today's sponsor.

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Bob: Hi, Pat. My name's Bob. I spent $20,000 upfront to guru marketers with little to no result in the last 12 months. I'm looking to resort to JVs. That way if I make money, you make money. Big problem is, on the internet, everybody wants to tell you how to do it but nobody wants to give you access to people, who want to do a JV with you.

Pat Flynn: Hey Bob. Thank you so much for the question today. I really appreciate it. And wow, $20,000 to spend with gurus and no ROI. There's a lot of digging that I think we need to do here. First of all, who is it that you're following. You don't need to answer this. I'm kinda just saying this, hypothetically. But who is it you're following? Why are you paying money to them? What is it that you expect? There's a lot of sides to this. There's the side of, well there's a lot of people out there who claim that they have a secret formula or the blueprint. Sometimes they are better at talking about those things than actually delivering on those promises. There's that side of it.

There's also the side, and I've experienced this myself, through teaching other people. A lot of times these people do have the blueprint and the formula. And it's about the person who's actually paying for this thing. Are they taking the action required? You kinda have to look internally to see; are you actually putting in the practice and the actual efforts of what these people are saying? And if you are and it's not working then there's something else that has to be figured out there.

I just want to provide a note of caution to everybody else out there who is listening. Just be careful about where you spend your money. Make sure you actually do diligence on who it is that you're potentially gonna be spending money with. I will say that, when I first started out, I spent some money initially on a course with an academy, called the Internet Business Mastery Academy. That was a monthly membership. I really liked that. I really enjoyed it.

It wasn't necessarily the content that was the best. Although, the content was great in Internet Business Mastery Academy. That academy is still around and I do appreciate everything Jason and Jeremy Frandsen have done for me. Jason Van Orden and Jeremy Frandsen and they're continue to rock at it. Excuse me, they continue to rock it. They have a great podcast out there that you can listen to called Internet Business Mastery.

What I got out of that community, in paying a monthly fee of about $97 a month, which is nowhere near $20,000 a year. I felt the value was in the community and connecting with other people there too. Bob I don't know if that is something that was available with these other things that you were purchasing. Definitely utilize if you can, these communities.

There's a lot of great communities out there with things related to building an online business, that are much more economical. For example, Youpreneur by Chris Ducker, is a great one with a great community behind it. Obviously Fizzle.co run by Corbett Barr and Chase Reeves and Barrett Brooks. It's an amazing community. Also, for very economical pricing. There's also Platform University by Michael Hyatt.

You kind of just have to gravitate toward who you gravitate toward the most, based on personality and the kind of teaching style that you like. Those are three that I would recommend if you're looking to get into sort of more membership based style teachings. I found that each of those can definitely give you an ROI and a return on investment there, for sure.

You had mentioned looking for JVs instead. And typically there are JVs…or JVs, for those of you who don't know, it's short for joint ventures. Typically, you joint venture or join up with people or partner with people, who you can both mutually benefit from each other's promotions and whatnot. Typically, a person who has a product will JV partner with a person who has an audience and will share some commissions or some of the payments or profits with the person who's promoting in front of their audience.

Unless you have some to offer, there isn't going to be, really anything that…it's gonna be difficult to find JVs especially when your first starting out. People are very selective with who they work with, who they promote. The trust that they have with their audience, that's the most precious thing and any good business person would know that. They're not just gonna open up their email list or promotions to anybody. That might be why it's difficult to find those relationships, Bob.

Really it's a long-term thing. What I would really do, is try to come up with something that is proven before you start getting into the JV partnerships. That's really where a lot of the partnerships that I have with people have come into play. People like Clay Collins and LeadPages and Nathan Berry from ConvertKit. These relationships that I have and partnerships that have forme; Where I do webinars and I promote their products in front of my audience. That only comes, because I try them and they have provided something for me in the past. I know their product and it works. Unless you have that sort of proven thing with people who have enjoyed that, it's gonna be very difficult to find those JV partners.

What I would really start with is, building a business that actually works. That actually have provided value. And working on getting those first customers. And just ROI yeah on 20k, that's quite a bit to get a return on. Start with your first customer. Start with that first step and that business that you have that's providing value, like I said, and serving others first.

Hopefully, Bob, I hope this gives you at least some direction. I really do believe that, you don't need to spend a ton of money. I will say that, I also know a lot of people who have spent more than what you've spent, to get access to certain people, who they know is gonna help them. For certain kind of coaching or week long trainings or month long or even yearly long trainings, to get access to people who they know, that they're gonna get a lot of help from, that aligns perfectly with their business.

It's kind of a two-way street. You gotta get that information that's gonna be helpful. But you gotta put it into action too and make sure you're gonna be held accountable for it and all those sorts of things. There's a lot of pieces to this puzzle. Bob, I just want to encourage you to keep going. Don't necessarily think about spending money to get results. Connect with the right people to get the results and that's really what it comes down to. If your looking for JVs, you gotta come up with something proven first.

Bob, thank you so much for the question. I wanna send you an Ask Pat t-shirt for having your question featured here on the show. I appreciate you and everybody else out there who's asking questions. Thank you so much. Just head on over to AskPat and you can ask your question right there. And have it potentially get featured here on the show and get a t-shirt too at the same time. So, yeah, that's the show. To finish off, like always do, here's a quote from Jeffery Gitomer. And he says “Quality performance starts with a positive attitude.” Cheers, take care. I'll see you the next episode of AskPat. Bye.