The real education isn’t the information you will find on the public blogosphere, or even my blog. The real gold mine of information, I mean the really valuable information, the few tips and tricks that could earn you tens of thousands extra each month are found when talking person to person, face to face. Although you can make alot of money personally by focusing online all day, if you were to also attend more events you would find yourself even further ahead and networked than if you did not. My personal opinion.
There are people in your life that you will meet, that will have dramatic difference in your life. Whether it is learning some good ideas from them or you end up partnering with them for instance, there are some key people that can and will make a major difference in your personal and business life. And the events are important because it will put you in a better position to meet the people who can really help you and give you insightful information that can accelerate your learning curve by several years. It is all about being at the right place, all of the time, and going to the events can place you in the best position for growth at that specific time.
Ad:Tech for me started 2 days prior to the event. What I mean is I had meetings before official ad:tech event started, and then would have meetings during the 3 day ad:tech spree, and then 2 days after ad:tech as well. For me, ad:tech was a 7 day event of face to face contact with all of the people I’ve been talking to online, and even meeting some other powerful people in the network personally. It has been great, and have made great new connections, and strengthened existing connections.
Although I can’t blog about every meeting I had of course, I did get a chance to goto the ad:tech blogger dinner, who I believe Ms Danielle put on. This was a lot of fun getting a chance to meet other bloggers in person, and really build a relationship.
[left to right] Greg Morgan, Garret Gee, me, Ian Lee, Gloria, Bob Buskirk, Ms Danielle, Ian Fernando.
The best part the event was 5 blocks away from my apartment in san francisco. I believe also the web 2.0 conference is next week just a few blocks away too in downtown san francisco.
The real information isn’t in the public blogosphere, it is at the events, at the dinners and at the parties. And even though I never went to a single party during college because I was working, I will goto them during the conferences because its business, and I get to exchange ideas with others. I was able to meet other local web 2.0 startups and even 2 people from a venture capital firm.
The next events I will be going to will be to our event, the meetup202 event. The media breakaway conference and affiliate summit east which we both already have passes for. If your at all serious about the affiliate marketing industry be there. To get different results you have to do different things. And if you are unsatisfied with your current situtation, not making enough affiliate income, and you are not coming to the events, well?…… You really gotta change what your doing then and start coming to the events if your trying to change your game. If you want to be someone who makes a serious amount of money in this business I will see you at the events, and if your not there, I won’t see you there at the events and I’ll be working with everyone else who did show up.
Sometimes success is so easy, we just have to do it. To many people message me everyday saying there going to do this and this, and then don’t do anything at all. So I no longer listen to what people say, I just watch what people do. If you tell me you want to make some serious money and then you do not go to the events, your not serious about making money. Ok…..
Now some people could be the exception to the rule and they already know most everything and already earn a large amount of money might not need to be at every event, and just need to implement what they already know. Thats fine, because they already have the knowledge, the skill and their network built up already. And I’d argue that those who are already grandmasters at what they do have been to the events before and networked with key people who have helped them, and whom they still work together with today. But the key to remember is, these people already earning a large amount relaxing now have invested their time before and gone to events and networked in the past to help them get to their current stage.
I challenge you to be one of the people who is results oriented instead of talk oriented. Someone who actually listens to good ideas and then goes and applies them and then says next, I’ve accomplished this, now what do I need to do, and then does it all over again. I say goto the events, and then people don’t go and then they ask me if there is something else they can do to build their business. Don’t they get it, I already gave the tip to goto the event, and if they want to get to the next level of knowledge they first had to implement the first tip, which was having them goto the event. If they don’t goto the event, and then ask for more tips, they didn’t implement the first tip, and I can’t help them get to the next level. What am I suppose to say to them? They already know what to do, they just have to do it. I can’t share tip number two, if they’re unwilling to implement tip number one, why waste mine, and everyone elses’ time?
What I’m saying is, if you want to take your skill to the next level, be at the right place all of the time. And you can do this by being at the events that are in your specific industry and put effort into making the most out of each event. Invest the time to search, and find the key people that will be able to help you out. I challenge you to come to theses events with the few who make it. If you are serious about affiliate marketing, let’s see it, so lets meet at next event ok? I look forward to meeting you there, take care, take charge and take none of this as an insult, but as a challenge to push ourselves and really make it to the events, and meet some key people who can increase your learning curve by several years. Make it happen!
We just launched a new Seattle Affiliate Marketing Meetup group. If you live in the area feel free to meet with us and other affiliate marketers in the Seattle, Washington area. These are casual meet ups. The goal is to gather a group of like minded individuals together to collaborate, network, and essentially have a fun time.
We are putting together a Bay Area meetup group for Pay Per Click Affiliate Marketers, although if you do SEO, or email marketing your welcome to join us too. We will be putting together the first event next month, April, after Ad:Tech. The date has not been determined yet, but we have just posted our meetup group to prepare for April. 