IM Gold

[Rob Toth]

This spawned from this facebook status and thread..

https://www.facebook.com/robthegenie...t=feed_comment

The 2 points, that I think would be fun to discuss here too are:

[1]

"Sad reality ... in my continued search for new talent and team members, I'm finding more and more very qualified, web marketing related talent available to work for $7 - $12 per hour. The same tasks that 3-4 years ago you'd have to go to India to find for those rates. Actual marketing savvy types ... not just "data entry" and general admin. This is likely the unfortunate by product of (1) the US economy's dip (2) the competition and pressure from a global marketplace and (3) the many many many who read everything IM related, attempted it for years but just couldn't succeed in it so now they are happy to use their talents for a guaranteed wage."

and

[2]

"... how about this though... get them AFTER the IM loophole. I don't want to be harsh but we all know that 19 out of 20 people in IM will quit or simply spin their wheels for years but not get anywhere. BUT, during that time... they will have read a lot of articles, bought a lot of ebooks and courses, attended seminars, used software, tested the waters. Meaning they are FULLY trained for the IM world. They "fail" for many reasons (some of whihch I rant about in www.IQuitIM.com ) ... but I'd rather hire them after that entrepreneurial drive has been crushed (it's sad but REAL) and after they've invested a lot of time and money into learning IM. Now they are terrific as a marketing assistant or subcontractor. You bring them the tasks for guaranteed money / salary in their pocket and they do the work. A lot of people are talking "offline gold" ... make a tonne of money selling your IM skills to offline businesses. I'd instead suggest "IM gold" ... make a very consistent, very reliable, and fair income from home providing services to successful IM businesses."

[Kenster]

In regards to your second point, you are completely right...there is so much IM talent out there and people with vast amounts of knowledge about marketing and IM but who have never made a dime online. Personally I think this has more to do with mindset and discipline then with actual knowledge.

Similar story...I always found it incredible that the affiliate managers at the CPA companies I work with are willing to work for 50k or whatever they make per year and they can see most of the pertinent details about the campaigns of people pulling in thousands and thousands of dollars a day. They have statistics out that wazoo and normally know enough to absolutely crush it, but many of them don't have that drive, that passion, that discipline to actually make money promoting CPA offers. They have the knowledge but not those other less describable qualities and mindset factors that make people a lot of money on their own. These are the types of people that are great to snag up and build a team with.

To be honest, building a team is something I have always struggled with. The trust needed to hand over campaigns and pertinent info is great and I have a hard time taking those types of risks, which are necessary to build a team. Something I need to work on!

But great points Rob!

[Steve Yakim]

Outsourcing is always a problem for me. Maybe I'm to much of a micro manager. It seems that it can take as long to explain what you want done to the VA as it would be to do it yourself. To me this outsourcing is good, and I use it, if it is a task that needs to be done over and over again.

I do little of the programming my self now and there are some instances where I could just make the needed changes my self but I've learned to be more patient. You would think that outsourcing would make things easier to do, but I still stuggle with it.

Graphics are a no brainer. I outsource it all. Does anyone have any suggestions for making this process easier to do? It would not be bad if you could always just call your VA up and tell them what you want done or to happen. But everything has to be written down.

I used to just send word documents but now I send pdfs to explain the project. I would like to hear how other people handle their outsourcing.

Best regards,
Steve Yakim

[Burt Lao]

Graphics are a no brainer. I outsource it all. Does anyone have any suggestions for making this process easier to do? It would not be bad if you could always just call your VA up and tell them what you want done or to happen. But everything has to be written down.

I used to just send word documents but now I send pdfs to explain the project. I would like to hear how other people handle their outsourcing.

Skype is a pretty sound tool to use when dealing with a VA you've outsourced somewhere abroad. With it's screen sharing features it's the best way to talk and show them what you need to be done. On that same note, you can also use any of the popular screen recording software, and have it saved for future reference should you have to train another VA.

I personally just voice record my directions or tasks, and email it. Then at the end of the day, for my email updates received, the task list is typed up with a checklist when it's completed.

[Rob Toth]

Steve...

I'm with Burt on this.

All my VAs are asked to install Skype (if they don't have it already). It's the primary tool. And, to supplement, I create short Jing videos to explain a task.