Teaching, Writing, Consulting - AND Keynoting...

Another paid gig one gets when one is an "expert" in a field is a "keynote" address, for which organizations pay very well.  My guess is "keynote" is shorthand for content, the speaker who has something to say, as opposed to the group housekeeping and awards announcements that make up meetings otherwise.  I've been doing several of these in the last year, but this one came with ribbons!

Catalogs Are King

I was on the U Washington campus the other day so I dropped in at the offices of the once glorious ASUW Experimental College.   I mentioned to the nice receptionist I had taught for 25 years with them, but had to decline once they cut catalog distribution.  I mentioned in the heyday they put out 140,000 catalogs and got 7,000 enrollments each quarter, a 5% response rate, which is fantastic.

I asked how they were doing now.  She looked it up.  20,000 catalogs and 1000 enrollments.

Hmmm...  so 20k is 1/7th of 140k, 1k is 1/7th 7k.  Exact!

Still 5% response rate.

The paper catalog is king in noncredit continuing education.

Why You need to make Your Course Free on youtube

Here is a common enough email...

Dear John,

After watching all of your videos (Some of them many times) I realized I MUST take your course. Thank you so much for providing humanity with such immensely valuable content and at no cost. I find your insights into economy and your way of teaching absolutely genius.

Anyway, I currently live in Barcelona, Spain and am trying to get an import/export business going and I really really want to take your class, but it would be realistically impossible to attend live sessions at 7-9PM with a +8hr time difference. What do you advise? How much would I miss without the sessions? Or is there an alternative?

Thank you very much.

Sincerely yours,

--
A D

Your youtubes sell your class. Some 50% of google searches end up on youtube, and google put youtubes high on searches because the front run the videos with ads from which they make money.

I learned from Gary North.

First Market, Then Make

Kevin checks in on a fine point...

On Feb 19, 2013, at 10:42 AM, Kevin wrote:

Hello John,

I have two questions I thought I would ask before tonight's class.

1.      As we begin to send out our proposals to the colleges should we already have in place a delivery system for our course (Mibbit, ed2go,..etc) or do the schools decide how the class is delivered?

One example I came across in my local area is http://ce.d214.org/cep/cep_online_classes.aspx

This is a continuing education course instructing prospective online students to visit ed2go.com/dist214  

Essentially I want to know is there anything I should have in place via web/course ability (before) submitting proposals to the schools?

***Our proposal has to do with marketing our course, to find if people are ready willing and able to promote it as it is.  There is a very good chance they are not ready willing and able, for whatever unknowable reason right now.  

If not, aren’t you glad you have not invested a few hundred hours into developing a course no one will take?

If not, aren’t you glad you can right now make changes, based on school feedback, so the course is in fact marketable?

So, most decidedly, we DO NOT want to have delivery methods yet.***

2.      Do you have any suggestions for how a new instructor should address reference requests on applications? Most of us if not all have no actual teaching experience to speak of.  Any references we’d normally use are unable to validate our teaching skillset.

Is the proposal weighed upon more than the instructor’s experience?

***If not teaching references, then topical references...  who knows and approves of your work?  List everyone you can think of, then arrange them by power, from a noted expert down to your mom.  Good press is probably worthless (what do they know?), but satisfied clients is good.***

Promotion Headline

I am testing out a way to recruit instructors, that is teach them myself, and the local newspaper has a sale on 1/4 page full color ads.  Do I surveyed my listserv on various headlines for "draw" and here is what I got.

55 and Older 100% of Net New Job Growth

So People are preferring hirees in my age group?  Better yet, get self-employed as an instructor...

Note that 100% of the job growth since the recession is in age group 55 and over.
Read more at http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/#im8BHg2JcULPxcug.99 

Better Websites

From Google:

Moving ads higher up on a page is a simple yet effective change that can have a big impact on your ad revenue. The area that's immediately visible when a page is loaded without scrolling down is known as "above the fold."

Here is a tool google offers, I used it, i'll see if it helps...

What Is Your Website Worth?

I went to http://www.freewebsitereport.org/ and put in my www.johnspiers.com website and found out it is the 4.5 millionth most viewed site on the web.  Say!  And it is worth $539 in advertising revenue per year!   Well, that's about right.  It pays for itself.

I put in http://hbhblog.blogspot.com/ which must bring in more revenue, but there is no report.  Sigh.

Promo Potentials Roundup

Assuming one is self-publishing and gets Bowker ISBN,  then...

1. Amazon

A. Amazon marketplace...  personal account, to sell your defective and signed books ON amazon.com.

B.  Amazon associates... personal selling THROUGH amazon.com... links to your own books and other goods on your own website, blogs, etc... for affiliate fees income.

C. Amazon.com Advantage... corporate selling TO amazon.com, your USA biz wholesaling books to amazon.

i. list your books for sale

ii. set up author central to promote yourself

iii. KDP facilities... book to kindle

iv. inside the book so amazon peple can read the entire book before buying (similar to google books)

D. Amazon.ca Advantage ... 

i same as item C but for for canada, 

ii. needs canadian bank account.  Easy to get.

2. Google books

A. read for free with sales link to self and amazon

b. Worldcat (automatic)

C. distribute droid versions instead of Kindle.

3. Apple iPublish.  So far, I know nothing about this.  I need to develop.

Magazine Articles

On Oct 12, 2011, at 5:42 PM, DS. wrote:

I like the idea of marketing myself to schools.  However, I really interested in writing for local papers, and or, magazines.  Are we going to be offered information that directly pertains to that? 

Hey D,

I am going to include everyone in this reply, because it is a good question.  

I consciously skipped the “write for magazines” strategy in my book and class because 30 years ago, as I considered writing a book and researched how to do so, every first chapter said “write for magazines” to start.  I decided my book is on what is new, not what can be had anywhere else.  along those , lines, please google

how to write for magazines

and check out

http://www.writersdigest.com/writing-articles

But upon reflection, there are some things I might say, some new stuff in this fast changing field...

Forbes magazine announced in its current issue that not only is it gathering up the best of its writers, and the best of the internet independents and print in its hard copy magazine for mail distribution, , it will now accept articles from advertisers, which it will mark as such.  they call it AdVoice, I call it a mistake.  Both examples in the magazine are incoherent, the misbegotten result of an advertiser trying to write a story but not be an advocate for itself.

Me eldest daughter longed to be a writer, and made some good money in her tweens as a extra on the TV show bill Nye the science guy, which was sold to Disney.  she made AFTRA scale and then spent it taking summer seminars in high school at Northwestern and Cambridge.  Expensive, but her money, so I did not object.

Her high school year she interned at the Seattle Times, and managed a minor scandal when as an unpaid intern, the newspaper gave her a byline (in fact three).  the union came crashing in, and demanded she be paid scale for the work.  she then was.

She formed the goal early on of becoming a writer for the LA times.  She was warned off a journalism degree by all working journalists, so took a BA in Comparative REligion.  She learned italian to land a stinger position for AP in Rome for her last quarter of college.

She freelanced and worked and applied and finally got  hired at the LA times.  How happy she was walking through that fantastic lobby to her cubicle.  And then watched the staff dwindle, budgets cut, corners cut, and then the stress of a dinosaur dying.  

At the same time Gawker and others were recruiting her, so she is making much more money writing in essence, a magazine and newspaper articles, but for web sites.

So, what is my observation?  In my book I say compose on the internet for all to see, and it is a calling card and example of your work.

Use HARO, as mentioned in the transcripts and book, to get quoted in articles, and if you are worth quoting, ought you not be contributing articles?

So my reply is what is the goal of writing for magazines?  if it is money, Look at what forbes is doing, and wonder at the future.  if it is just exposure, well that is another thing.  if it is on the way to getting a book out, then my book covers that, examples thereof.

Catalog is King

Catalog is king in enrollments.  Catalogs may direct people to the website, but the catalog is what gets enrollments, and cannot be replaced.  At about $7 per enrollment (industry standard), nothing can beat that for promotion.  Not display ads, not googleAds, not online promotion.  As the catalog goes, the program goes.

Many schools are emphasizing the instructor do the promotion.  I've been watching this for several years, and I think it is a mistake for a couple of reasons.  The promotional means, facebook, twitter, blogs, etc are free, not effective.  People spend a lot of time on them but get no real return. Ogilvy talks about impressions vs sales.  Some one may have 20,000 facebook followers, but what are the sales?  How much time do they spend feeding the multitudes?

Now I see the technologies as a way of teaching, delivering content, for example, I video'd my live class and put it up. The students see my live class, and non-students are driven to my online class.  But that takes me no time or effort.

I am working on the idea of using youtube and maybe facebook/twitter for "critical steps" that is as one considers a critical idea there is a youtube to watch maybe 3 minutes long, and facebook access to discuss it... or a critical step like visiting a buyer, a youtube to watch and twitter support.

But as viable promotion, I don't think it pays.  Catalog is king.

Also, the school brings 2 or 3 very important functions to the deal:  In every case, online and face to face, the school brings brand.  

We instructors are unknown, so what people sign up for is "Orange Coast College course," that is the brand they trust.  The second thing is promotion, the catalog.  In the case of face to face classes, the third thing is the classroom itself, the physical space.

What if I am wrong about self-promotion of courses, and among the many people trying to do so, someone figures out how to beat the $7 per registration that the school catalog offers?  That information would spread fast, and be quickly adopted far and wide.  Catalogs would wither away.  Instructors would then start promoting themselves as the brand.  At that point, why do they need the schools?  Why would they share any revenue?  If they can promote themselves, fill classes without the catalog, then I think you would find these noncredit instructors doing just that.

The other part, finding physical classrooms for live face to face classes is getting easier as the economy leaves more buildings empty.

Again, I don't think online promotion pays.  I've been watching closely, testing myself, and it just is not there, maybe someday, but not yet.  At the same time, the catalog is an indisputable performer.

I believe, with the LERN organization, that the battle is to be fought with the catalog.  It is the tool for the job, and with efforts its performance can be improved, and I would refer you to LERN for that.

I'd hate to see, in fact I have seen, some programs get between a belief in online promotion and less emphasis on catalogs, only to find dwindling enrollments from lack of catalog effort and no increase from online enrollments.  I won't name names, but I can point out  half dozen easily so far.

For my part I formalized a hypothesis that online promotion will drive enrollments and tested it.  I'd like to see 100 schools do the same.  then we'd have a better idea, and act accordingly.  I say online promotion is a non-starter.  This means the programs are safe.  I also think if and when it is proven instructors can generate their own enrollments, then the programs will wither away.

Cherish and protect those catalogs!

My Books Available On Amazon.Fr

Well, via Kindle...  so Amazon.com serves Kindle versions into France, Belgium, and Monaco, wherein people there can buy and download the books, but I am compensated via US$ remittances.  I priced Perish Your Publisher at the lowest possible ($2.99) and How Small Business Trades Worldwide at the regular $9.99, to see how they each do at those price points.

Video Studio

Here is a picture of my "studio" where I filmed my book trailer.  As you can see it is just a desk in front of bookshelves as props, and a $200 video camera, with a cheap microphone.  Then I used iMovie (mac) to edit and produce the film, with a little help from my friends.

Booktrailer

I finally got my book trailer (as opposed to a movie trailer) up on youtube... next I put it up on Amazon.com, etc...

Jessie Childs

I read an excellent book by an author named Jessie Childs, and I reviewed it with five stars on Amazon.  I was astonished to see only one review when I got there, the book is way too good for only 3 stars.  Well, since there was only one other review, she is on average now at 4 stars.  Very strange for a world class book, and her sales are in the 700,000 range, at least today (meaning none...)

I googled her to email her to suggest she remind admiring readers to review her book on amazon.com.  She has a website, but all contact with her must be though her agent and publisher.

Two things wrong here... to sell books today you must offer "you" to the reader as well.  You can make them pay on a "closer you get, the more you pay" basis, but direct contact must be there.  Childs needs an email address she reads, a snail mail address she attends.  Childs cannot be contacted directly.  A reader wants to write the author, not the agent.

In my particular case, some of what I will say the agent will not like, so it is unlikely to be forwarded.

And her book is with limited access on GoogleBooks, another mistake.  If researchers cannot land on every page of the book, they are less likely to find what they are looking for and buy the book.

No doubt she believes her publishers, a world-class outfit, will take care of all of the necessary promotion for her. Well, several years into publication and just two ratings on Amazon?  She is an excellent talent.  She needs to perish her publisher and start making top dollar as a writer.

Amazon POD Suggests A Kind of PYP Strategy

Amazon.com's POD imprint, CreateSpace, offers the chance to get your worked critiqued and feedback as you create... my goodness this sounds familiar...

Not Uncommon Sentiment

Hi John,   Thanks a lot for your quick reply.  I read the chapter 8 online, but I want to read the real book.  For some reason, I understand the content much better if I read on paper.  I will email you after reading.  It was so encouraging to hear that you could help me develop a practical strategy.   I really appreciate your help!   Best wishes,   Jing

Doh! The New Publishing Model

It dawned on me during a conversation with a co-conspirator the other day that the the new book publishing model is the old music publishing model.  Recall the old days when music was free on the radio, and you paid for albums and concerts.  So now with google books and youtube, you writing is free on googlebooks and your teaching is free on youtube, and people pay for your albums (books) and pay for your concerts (seminars).

Here is the deal...  by giving my courses away free on youtube.com, I get very wide distribution worldwide, nd the distribution focusses on those who want the info on the topic... so far some 33,000 uploads.  I get nothing from most of those people, but I can track about $5000 a year in revenue from those who do subsequently buy the book or take the seminar.

So it is like radio which was free to the listener, but the closer you got to the artist, the more you paid (album, concert.)  Now Paul McCartney gets 5 cents everytime they play Yesterday on the radio, but I also get a few cents everytime someone clicks through on an ad google throws up at viewers watching my videos, so the analogy continues.

Payola was a pay to play scandal in radio, which was unfair because radio waves were limited by law (not by physics, the fact we limit who gets to use what part of the radio spectrum is bad law, economics and physics) and youtube.com has a sort of payola, where you can pay to be the top listing in a search for say my topic, videos on small biz int'l trade.  But who cares, it is open and transparent, so it is fair.  But I also get my own channel, like having my own radio station, on youtube.com.

You have to think differently, or maybe just old school, to thrive in the new publishing industry.

Konrath On Self Publishing

Thriller superstar Konrath has a very good summary of the traditional publishing model in which he works...  his article has almost 500 posts, a good summary of the attitude of writers.  Iconoclastic.

Kindle Gets Competition

Just in time for Christmas, Googlebooks opens up.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS reports

Google... opened its long-awaited electronic book store Monday, competing against Amazon.com Inc. and further accelerating the shift of book distribution from brick-and-mortar stores to the Web.

***Another theatre just shut down up the street from me.  This is not because fewer people are finding moving pictures entertaining, it is just more people are finding alternates to the mass viewing theatre.  There will always be theatres.  There will always be books.  The issue will be standards that meet customer expectations.***

Over the past decade, the number of independent stores operated by the ABA's membership has fallen from 3,000 to 1,700, the ABA said. McQuivey expects hundreds more to close during the next decade.

The upheaval will occur as sales of e-readers, tablets and electronic books steadily rise during the next five years.

...

Even larger book retailers are feeling the pressure to shake things up.

Activist investor William Ackman on Monday offered to finance a $963 million bid by Borders Group to buy rival Barnes & Noble Inc. Combined, the two retailers operate about 1,400 stores, many of which would presumably be closed if they were to combine forces.

Although most analysts doubted a deal would come together, the proposal underscores the challenges facing traditional book retailers as they look for ways to lower their costs.

...

Google's electronic book store, in the works for more than a year, draws upon a portion of the 15 million printed books that the Mountain View-based company has scanned into its computers since 2004.

About 4,000 publishers, including CBS Corp.'s Simon & Schuster Inc., Random House Inc. and Pearson PLC's Penguin Group, are also allowing Google to carry many of their recently released books in the new store.

Those publishing deals will ensure that most of the current best sellers are available in Google's store, said Amanda Edmonds, who oversaw the company's partnerships.

...

Google's e-books will work on the Nook, Sony Corp.'s Reader devices and practically every other e-reading device except the Kindle. Google achieves this with the help of Adobe Inc.'s copy-protection system for e-books.

...

Google plans to offer sharp discounts on many of its e-books but it will still pay publishers 52 percent of the list price for sales made on its site, unless another arrangement has been negotiated with an outside agency.

The formula means that even if Google elects to sell a book with a $10 list price for $6, the publisher would still get $5.20.

The revenue-sharing formula changes slightly when the electronic sales occur through one of the independent book merchants or other partners Google hopes to recruit. Google didn't disclose the precise split of these arrangements.

***All of this is inevitable, and will lead to the best all-round deal for all concerned.  The best part of this is with digitl books, there is a no return policy.***

"In the long run, I don't think Google has a strong appetite to make it easier for book sellers to stay alive," McQuivey said.

———

***Right, it is the booksellers job to keep themselves viable, by serving customers.***