Use twitter? Click the green retweet button on the right please!

Here are five links to the five winning videos:

video 1  -  video 2  - video 3 -  video 4  -  video 5

What a bunch of cool AND VERY SMART readers my newsletter has. Want to meet a few of them in video?

Watch these short videos for some great SIMPLE marketing ideas!

I put out a call a few weeks ago for you, my faithful newsletter/blog readers to put up a simple youtube.com video that expresses how you feel about my blog, newsletter, books, training sites etc.

…and WOW…was my wife rolling her eyes as she watched these!

Seriously though - thanks guys. Great work.

Here are the prize winners in no particular order (click the title to see the vid):

1. No video camera needed to be cool on youtube!

If the goal was to give the judge a big head you did quite nicely on this one Mr. Robert Chic.

The first 30 seconds of this submission was made using animoto.com. Animoto is free and it’s point and click simple. Check it out.

LESSON: Notice how Robert left the final phrase on screen for several seconds at the end of the video. This is a great youtube strategy because the website link is seen longer that way.

OBSERVATION: I wish I was half as cool as the soundtrack Robert picked for me.

2. short-n-sweet like buffalo meat

If you only have time to watch one make it this one.

Watch this 35 second gem put together by Thomas using ZERO video skills. He also chose to upload a few (VERY CREATIVE) digital pics to animoto.com and made a killer little video that deserve major props.

This is how simple and powerful video can be WITHOUT A VIDEO CAMERA. Along with his video he sent a heartfelt thank you note for the $12K he’s earned so far from an idea he recently learned on MySilentTeam.com.

You are welcome Thomas…and you are also a winner in the video contest!

3. Press record & start talkn’

Around here we calls guys like Jeff “good ‘ol boys” and they don’t mind it.

I really appreciate when someone is brave enough to stand in front of a camera and just talk. Thanks for the good word Jeff. Congrats on your FIRST EVER youtube video…and congrats on the prize it won you!

4. Never metcha, but I love ya!

What an honor. Dmitry Vilchitsky is a native Russian speaker now living in New York. He’s one of those guys that you’ll probably like instantly (and he has a very cool accent)…and it doesn’t hurt that he had a lot of nice things to say about me… and my book… and our membership websites!

Congrats Dmitry. Great work.

TIP FOR ALL OF US: Although I REALLY enjoy hearing long videos about how great you think my stuff is, it would actually serve YOU better to keep it shorter. The average length of time that a youtube.com video will keep a viewers attention is far less than 8 minutes. The only exception is when the topic is of great interest to the viewer.

5. “I’ll be there in a minute…”

Just an honest, specific, heartfelt review. Stay for the ending on this one.  This is powerful in its simplicity and will make you laugh with the ‘outtakes’ at the end including when Mike is interrupted by being called away from the camera while “working”…funny, and real. Thanks for this one.

Leave your comments and questions here…or go give these guys a five star ranking on youtube!

Click here to read
In this newsletter:
===============
1. Selling info on eBay as a long term business
2. The magic button that ALWAYS leads to success
3. Quick tips:
- Honesty is very self serving
- College degree or MySilentTeam.com membership?

Please click the green retweet to the right if you use twitter

If there is one common characteristic among those that I see succeeding vs. those that I see failing it’s this…

Attitude

Don’t mistake this article for a lame “rah rah” session.

It’s gut check time.  I’ve got some hard questions for you and some pretty specific observations too.

I literally don’t know ANY people that consider themselves successful in business, personal life, spiritual matters, parenting, marriage or any other area of life that are characterized by having a bad attitude.

Before you start thinking that success in these areas leads to a ‘good attitude’ consider this…

Try to think of ANYONE in your personal history of friends, family, or business associates that started out with a generally BAD ATTITUDE towards life in general and then somehow had some success and ONLY THEN started displaying an overall good attitude. I’ll bet you can’t think of many (if any).

On the other hand I can think of DOZENS of examples of people that, in spite of bad circumstances and obstacles REFUSED VICTIM-HOOD and instead CHOSE to have a good attitude about life and the opportunities in front of them and they went on to do great things and have what anyone watching could easily consider SUCCESS.

Once you’ve been in any sort of business that deals with people day in and day out it becomes second nature to identify people as having a “good attitude” or a “bad attitude”. It’s pretty obvious most of the time.

What makes a “bad attitude” so apparent?

A victim mentality, instant refund seekers, magic button seekers, quick fix short term thinkers and lifelong tire kickers really stand out after awhile.

Daily I hear from people that are MAKING GREAT THINGS HAPPEN and I also hear from victims, complainers, whiners etc. that aren’t doing much except being victimized, complaining and whining.

Which are you?

Is is POSSIBLE that your attitude might be holding you back?

What do you think? Am I on to something? Please leave a comment below…and read the comments left by others.  We can all learn something here.

Please click the green retweet if you have twitter ->

I have a theory to share and I think you’ll thank me later.

There is a good chance that your next computer MUST BE A MAC.

This is coming from a die hard PC guy.

For me 90% of what I do on my computer involves internet access. I need a reliable computer that turns on quickly, switches from screen to screen quickly, and doesn’t lock up. It needs to be fast and stay fast. That’s all I ask.

I’ve ALWAYS been a PC guy…until recently. My last real job was selling Microsoft software to 90% PC guys and we always scoffed at the Mac crowd as being artsy fartsy.

CONFESSION: A few weeks ago I bought an iMac and I LOVE IT. No going back.

Here’s how the mac trend sneaked into our home…

I won a mac notebook about a year and a half ago (in an affiliate contest where I was so close to beating Frank Kern for the top spot) and I quickly gave it to my wife so she could blog and do her social thing online with it.  I started noticing something though…when I would borrow her 6 month, 1 year and even 18 month old MAC to jump online and do something ‘quick’ it ALWAYS worked and was ALWAYS fast.

I’m not a mac geek by any means, but fast and dependable internet access are a must. I was so impressed that I bought my own iMac.

It took me about one hour to transition over…I’ve hardly touched my old PC notebook since.

It’s nice to be able to hop into my office to check something on my iMac and hop out 30 seconds later having completed the task. That was never possible with my windows machines except for the first few days out of the box.

At some point the few hundred more dollars you need to buy a mac really makes sense especially if it means taking back control of minutes or even hours of your day. I can get so much more done in a day now that a MAC would have been worth it even if it would have costs me three times more than it did.

What do you think? Let’s chat it out in the comments…please leave your thoughts below. Am I nuts? Are you thinking about a mac? Have I convinced you?

If you use twitter please click the retweet button –>

Do you ever feel like you are wasting time online? Commit 10 minutes to any of these ideas and just watch what happens next…

(Can’t see the play button above? Use the below link to the MP3 file.)
Ten ideas that take ten minutes

Links mentioned in audio:

•  blogger.com / wordpress.com
•  ezinearticles.com
•  facebook.com or twitter.com
  (if you join either be sure to follow me using either facebook.com/jimcockrum and twitter.com/jim_cockrum)
•  MySilentTeam.com (talk about this stuff with other people here!)
•  OfflineBiz.com
• eBay.com classifieds (link to my video about ebay classified ads)
• Don’t forget about craigslist.com - it’s 100% free!
•  aweber.com

If you use twitter please click the retweet button and help spread the word about my free radio show! Thanks! –>>

Listen to my first professional radio show (recorded on Wednesday)…and then click the comment button below. Based on your feedback and suggestions the show will continue, grow, and provide you with more of what you need to succeed online and in life. That’s the goal.

The show will be recorded and available on that same page each week. No need to listen ‘live’. Get it here:

 http://www.wsradio.com/internet-talk-radio.cfm/shows/Creative-Internet-Income-Strategies-Radio.html
Click above to go directly to my show’s page. The link to listen is toward the middle of the page.

http://www.wsradio.com/internet-talk-radio/network.cfm/station/Online-Sellers-Radio.html
Or use this link. If you use this second link you’ll see all the shows on the new network & my show is third from the top: TITLE: Creative Internet Income strategies

Please leave a comment once you check it out.

I’m often asked why I established two different membership sites.

Both sites are industry leading sites with thousands of members. Each one will teach you how to make money as an “internet marketer”, but they are two entirely different sites…as I’ll explain in this audio:

If you can’t see the play button here’s a link to the file:
JimsTwoSites.mp3

These are the sites mentioned in the audio:

OfflineBiz.com

MySilentTeam.com

My Top Ranking on IMReportCard.com

SilentJim.com

Click here to read
In this newsletter:
===============
1. Jim’s thoughts on the New FTC rules
2. My video contest is under way
3. Quick tips:
- Make twitter SIMPLE
- MySilentTeam.com close to hitting a landmark

Please leave a comment or question below, and if you use twitter click the green retweet button over there —>

For those of us that fall under the jurisdiction of the FTC (Federal Trade Commission) some of the rules of online marketing are going to be changing very soon (December ‘09).

For those NOT under the jurisdiction of the FTC you just got a HUGE advantage over those of us that call the U.S. home!

Here’s the official announcement:
http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2009/10/endortest.shtm

In summary there are two changes that will effect ALL businesses under FTC authority both on and offline.

ENDORSEMENTS AND DISCLOSURES

The first change is a stiffening of the rules in regard to endorsements and disclosure.  If you do any affiliate marketing you now need to let your customers know that you stand to possibly profit if the customer goes on to purchase an item that you are endorsing. This effects blogs, twitter, email, websites, book review articles, membership sites, EVERYTHING.

TESTIMONIALS

The days of the “results not typical” disclaimer are now dead. Marketers must now somehow be able to state the average results of what the average user/customer can expect to achieve or they should probably NOT use any testimonials of any kind.  It will be pretty funny to watch as marketers try to come up with “average” results calculations for things like pain management, food taste, exercise benefits, model upgrades etc. This silly law should provide for some interesting wording on the part of marketers. Look for some VERY FAT pay days for the FTC as they go after helpless violators such as a soda company that couldn’t do the math correctly on the average taste bud effect of their new diet drink.

At least we’ll get to see a bunch of new creatively worded commercials on TV!

My personal opinion on the changes?  Silliness. I LOVE to hear about quality products from people that I trust and could personally care less if they benefit or not from the endorsement. If the product stinks I get a refund and now know not to trust their opinion any longer. Does it really take a new law to make that concept work?

The second change on testimonials is INSANELY RIDICULOUS. It seems to me that by design the new rule leaves so many gaping holes that the FTC can literally strike down ANYONE that uses ANY form of marketing testimonials should they choose to.

You can see the first draft of my new “testimonial” disclaimer that I came up with CLICK HERE

Remember - I’m not an expert. Consider me just another big goof-off that shouldn’t be trusted until you do your research… and I’m certainly no lawyer worthy of giving any legal advice!

Here’s what an actual Internet lawyer (Mike Young) came up with as a disclaimer for the “Endorsements/Disclosures” FTC change (I’m not sure I’m capable of such perfect language as this because there’s no silly edge to any of it):

MATERIAL CONNECTION DISCLOSURE: You should assume that the sender of this e-mail has an affiliate relationship and/or another material connection to the providers of goods and services mentioned in this message and may be compensated when you purchase from a provider. You should always perform due diligence before buying goods or services from anyone via the Internet or offline.

And another guy that is taking all of this FTC stuff quite seriously put a nicely worded notice on his blog:
http://www.askthebuilder.com/Disclosure_Policy.shtml

As far as testimonials go you’ll have to make your own decision, but as for me I’ll probably blot out all monetary results from all of my testimonials and start promoting even more the fact that you can meet all of my past customers any time you’d like to by joining my membership sites at MySilentTeam.com and OfflineBiz.com. Join the discussion forum and find out for yourself if I’m a goof off or actually worth listening to.

This is where all of that crazy “reputation management” stuff that I’ve been talking about all along starts to pay off! Treat people well and they’ll stay loyal.  Let others speak highly of you without the expectation of return favor. Achieve that and none of this will matter.

And just to be clear…if you ever see me talk about, endorse, or discuss a product just assume that I’m including an affiliate link. If you don’t trust me don’t buy what I recommend, but if you do trust me there’s a good chance I’m marketing it as an affiliate.

Please leave a comment or question below, and if you use twitter click the green retweet button above.

PLEASE CLICK THE GREEN RETWEET IF YOU USE TWITTER:

I’m putting together my personal take on the new FTC laws going into effect in December and will publish it in my newsletter soon (subscribe for free in the upper left hand corner), but in the mean time here’s my first draft for your consideration and comment. If I don’t post any updates after this please consider this my full response to the new law:

“DISCLAIMER:

NONE of the results achieved by me or by any of my students or readers are TYPICAL.

If you consider yourself to be ‘typical’ or ‘average’ then go find a real job or better yet a generous government program and save us all a bunch of wasted time. People that succeed in life possess extraordinary abilities that you DO NOT and WILL PROBABLY NEVER have.

The ability to turn off the TV and read a book occasionally, or the ability to put aside selfish short sited desires in order to pursue larger long term goals makes some of us freakishly superior and you don’t have what it takes to join us. So please - just give up now and go eat some ice cream and watch a movie. DO NOT BUY MY PRODUCTS.

You’ve heard it said “results may vary” right? Well, yours won’t. You won’t get ANYTHING from ANY of what I have to offer.

The average or typical results that anyone can expect from reading ANY of my books or articles is a dead honest ZERO. There is nothing there for you. As far as you know every testimonial about me on the Internet is made up anyway so why bother? How can you possibly trust ANYTHING on the Internet?

If however you would like to actually meet and talk to the people behind those testimonials you can do so at my open forum membership sites MySilentTeam.com and OfflineBiz.com.  Sadly though - you won’t find any typical people there…only those freakishly superior people that always seem to succeed when you keep failing.

Why are you still reading this? I told you to go watch a movie.”

Since the FTC wants to know the average results that people can expect there it is in black and white. Please post your comment or whiny complaint below