Nothing like having your bluff called by a legendary writer and creator…

For a few years now, I’ve been saying I’m a writer. An author. Ask me what I really want to do and, behind closed doors, I’ll tell you I want to write a transcendent book every 2 years, speak on stuff that changes lives twice a month and teach a course on the renegade lifestyle and entrepreneurship, both privately and at a university.

Holy crap…was that out loud?!

Thing is, I also have to support a family and I like to be comfortable, so when it comes to me being a writer, I’ve been keeping this whiteboard of book ideas that I’d like to write and that I think I can sell to a large, hungry market. And, sitting here, for the better part of a year and a half, not writing my next book.

Not because I don’t have ideas. Hell, I’ve got tons.

But because I’ve been trying to suss out which idea will have the most commercial potential. That, and my “people” essentially told me, don’t bother writing the next one until Career Renegade has run it’s course, because the publishers will tell you what they want you to write next. Plus, you want to get paid to write, right?

Then, along comes book and screenwriting legend, Steven Pressfield (The War of Art, The legend of Baggar Vance, Gates of Fire, Tides of War) with a riff on his blog about how he chooses what he’s going to write next.

In his post, Pressfield reveals:

The people I was meeting with were uniformly smart, motivated, funny. They treated me with respect. They were good peeps. What was wrong? Was it me? This was serious. The emotion was such a downer that I thought, I can’t keep feeling this and stay in this business. What was happening? Finally it hit me.

I realized that floating in the air over every meeting I had been on was an unspoken assumption. The execs and producers and studio people all shared this assumption, and they assumed—because I was in the room with them—that I shared it too.

The assumption was this: We will do anything for a hit.

I don’t fault that position. It’s a good business model. If ultra-violence will get us a smash, let’s go with ultra-violence. If jerk-off teen comedies work, crank ‘em out. Movies based on board games, old TV shows, comic book characters … cue ‘em up, let’s roll.

The problem for me was I didn’t share that assumption. That was why these meetings were depressing me so much. I hated those kinds of movies. That wasn’t why I was here at all! I had decided to take a crack at the movie business because I loved movies; I wanted to write stuff that meant something to me. Movies like the ones I worshipped. Movies I myself wanted to see.

Wham!

I want to make money. I need to make money.

But, you know what, I write not just because someone believes my content has blockbuster potential and is willing to pay me. I write at least in part because that’s who I am and what I do. Because it’s proven itself a powerful channel to connect with and impact others.

But, here’s the hard part. The one Pressfield seems to have found peace with, yet I still struggle with.

He continues:

I drew two big circles on a piece of paper. In one I wrote STORIES I LOVE. In the other, STORIES THAT MIGHT SELL. These were two separate circles. But, I thought, let’s move them together. Is there an overlap? Is there a quadrant, however miniscule, where these two spheres intersect? Yes, there is. That tiny sliver I called MY BUSINESS….Here’s the interesting part: it didn’t work.

…As much sense as the overlapping circles made in theory, they didn’t work for me in practice. What did succeed was being totally stupid and jumping off a cliff. That’s my business plan and I’m sticking to it.

That sliver, the commercially-viable sweet spot of which Pressfield writes is a bit like the psychic Mafia.

Every time you try to get out, it just keeps pulling you back in. I’ve operated within the sweet spot in business and it’s served me well and generated millions in revenue.

But, doing so in the context of my own pure, solitary creative output has become a far bigger struggle.

And, it seems, the more skilled I become at my craft, the more pronounced the struggle becomes.

I know, intuitively, that it is possible to reach a place where craft, seasoning, intention and action become so exquisitely aligned, the rules cease to apply. I’ve seen it happen. We all have. And I’ve experienced passing moments in that gorgeous place.

Questions is, how do you know when you’ve arrive at that place where the rules no longer bind you?

How do you know when to build it and simply trust they will come?

Or, like the guy who asks how much the Lamborghini costs, does that very fact that the question’s being asked imply you’ve not yet arrived?

And, if you haven’t…

Is there some accelerant you can pour on the process beyond time in the game?

I’m working hard on the answer.

And, coming ever closer to getting stupid and jumping off a cliff..

How about you?

In the advertising world, it’s commonly agreed that the headline is responsible for about 90% of an ad’s effectiveness. Same thing in the book world. The title does nearly all the heavy lifting. And, it’s no different in newspapers and social media, especially places like twitter where all you’ve to sell the click is the headline. Or digg.com, where a brief glance at the headline makes or breaks your shot at hitting the front page.

Your headlines can either launch you…or bury you.

Which makes you wonder. Why do so many bloggers spend so much time on the body of a post, then punt when it comes time to create the headline?

So, how do you write headlines that rock?

Here are 7 things that’ll help make your headlines sing, pull, lure and lull. One big picture and 6 a bit more under the radar…

First, SEO Optimize Your Headlines.

Let’s talk about SEO first, because that’s the, how do I say this, suckier part of writing headlines at least for me. In fact, it’s the part I bailed on for most of my blogging career, until I realized how critical it was in driving search engine traffic to my blog.

Simply put, search engines are looking for the most relevant answers to their search queries. How they determine relevance is a complex, ever-evolving formula, but what IS clear is that the title of your post plays a significant role.

So, if someone is searching for “clubs for balding molecular biologists,” there’s a good chance that a post with a headline that closely matches that search term will end up well ranked and send traffic (at least the 3 people and 1 cat that search for this term).

What’s the takeaway?

Use google’s free eternal keyword tool to search on a ton of different keywords and phrases to determine which ones are both relevant to your target readership and have decent search volume, but aren’t hyper-competitive (this will all be in the reports). You can also check out SEOBook’s keyword tool or the even the Scribe Wordpress plugin. Then, see if you can integrate those keywords and phrases into your headlines…WITHOUT SOUNDING LIKE A BOT!

But Remember, SEO Is Just The Beginning…

Back in 1932, legendary copywriter, John Caples, wrote a book called Tested Advertising Methods. It quickly became the bible of direct response copywriters and the coolest thing is, it’s as relevant today as it was back then. Because, headlines and copy are fundamentally about appealing to human nature and, while the human condition evolves, human nature has stayed largely the same for thousands of years.

We still respond to the same basic triggers.

Caples shared three critical elements that make for high impact headlines:

• Curiosity—Craft your headlines to create a sense of intrigue, an incomplete thought or a questions that just has to be answered.

• News—Either report news with your post or piggyback your topic onto breaking news that’s relevant to the interests of the reader, and

• Self Interest—Speak to the desires, fears, needs and emotional triggers of your reader. Ask, “what’s in it for them?”

These same principles can be used to guide your quest to create compelling headlines. The ones that stop people in their tracks and get your content passed around in social media and social bookmarking/voting sites like crazy.

And, while you’re at it, why not go for the headline triple-threat—combine all three elements in one headline…and you may very well have a slam dunk.

Some examples include:

• Are Your Sleep Habits Making You Fat Nasty and Dumb?
• Why Entrepreneurs Should Eat Their Young
• Five Grammatical Errors that Make You Look Dumb
• They Laughed When I Sat Down at the Piano, But When I Started to Play (ad written by Caples).
• How to Lose 20 lbs. of Fat in 30 Days… Without Doing Any Exercise
• How I Burn 600 Calories a Day Blogging
• How to Make Exercise More Fun Than Sex
• Headless Body in Topless Bar (1983 NY Post Headline)

Three more considerations:

• Numbers – One of the thing that makes a headline, copy or story memorable is how concrete it is. Copywriters have known this for years. More recently, the Heath brothers proclaimed it one of the critical elements that makes a message memorable in their bestseller, Made To Stick. And, one of the easier ways to make content more concrete is to add numbers. So, in a headline, rather than saying, “Here’s How to Get The Lead Out and Feel More Energized,” you might say, “7 Tips to Double Your Energy in 7 Minutes.” BTW – copywriting and internet marketing lore says the number 7 always converts better than any other, but I’ve never found the research to prove it or known anyone who’s actually tested it.

• Presuppositions – This is an NLP terms that also means “assumed facts.” I love to write headlines that presuppose the reader is experiencing something, then speak to that presupposition. Doing this draws the reader in much more effectively. So, for example, the headline, “Top 10 Ways to Unbake Your Brain” assumes that your brain is already baked and that you’re looking for a way out. With a world filled with pervasive stress, this is a pretty safe assumption. Then, I build on the presupposition by providing 10 solutions to the assumed pain (self interest), and implying that this is new information (news), but holding back the strategies (curiosity).

• Overriding Purpose of Headlines—Let’s add one last element to Caples’ list of three compelling headline qualities. And, that’s what legendary copywriter, Joe Sugarman, defined as the essential purpose of the headline:

• To get peoples’ attention, then
• To get them to read the next line

Wrapping it all up…

We’re left with a pretty interesting and fun challenge—how to create headlines that are appealing to search engines while also triggering the human emotions and behaviors that make readers stop cold, read the headline, then be irresistibly compelled to dive into the post.

Meet that challenge and your life as a blogger just got a whole lot easier.

So, what do YOU think?

I confess, I’m obsessed…

Strike that. Possessed. With the art of storytelling.

It’s why I’m about to spend four 10-hour days in a NYC workshop led by Robert McKee called simply Story next week. McKee’s taught many of the top screenwriters and novelists in the world how to craft stories that have defined the genres for decades.

Because, storytelling isn’t just entertainment, nor is it just about books and movies. Storytelling is about power. The power to transport, enrapture, uplift, inspire, devastate, surprise, enthrall, destroy, eviscerate, elevate, drive to tears, laughter, love, hysteria, awe and inspire action.

Powerful stories told beautifully wield immense potential.

So, when I was offered a sneak peak at a movie based on the first book in Swedish author Stieg Larsson’s Milennium series, I couldn’t say no.

Partly, because the novels have sold more than 25 million copies (I’m so easily swayed by social proof). Partly, because the trilogy, beginning with The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo, has been heralded as a stunning example of dark, moving, deeply engaging storytelling. And, maybe I was even swayed by the mysterious “supposed” heart attack that killed Larsson, an oft-threatened anti-right wing activist, before the books were even published (conspiracy theorists, delight)!

When the dvd arrived, I unwrapped it and popped it.

First surprise…it was in Swedish! Ack! My friend never mentioned that to me.

I’m generally not a foreign film guy, but this became an interesting challenge for me. Could the power of the story, the acting, the cinematography overcome the challenge of having to follow along with subtitles? Two and a half hours later, the answer was…bigtime.

I hadn’t known the story before watching the movie. It was beautifully filmed in the cold Swedish countryside. But, it wasn’t the setting that drew you in, it was the characters, their quest and their struggles.

Raw, flawed, honest, conflicted, constantly bouncing between a sense of justice, service and revenge.

It felt unfiltered. Very un-PC. And, it immediately pulled you in and kept you immersed in the arc, sometimes cringing, other times pondering, still others exalting. It felt complete. Not that it left no questions unanswered. In fact, it set up the second book/movie the way a master copywriter sets up the sale. You’re left simultaneously satisfied and teased. Knowing there’s more to come.

I sometimes wonder if story has become increasingly relegated to the level of second class citizen.

Forced to stand in line behind special effects, glitz and A-list celebs with a proven draw. The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo is a stunning example of how to bring it back to the center. And, I’ve no doubt, that’s what’s driven the books to such an extraordinary level. I’ll be buying copies of all three.

Which brings us to why I was was given a preview copy of the movie and asked to write anything I wanted about it—The big, bad Dragon Tattoo Blog Hunt!

If you’re one of my regular readers, here’s what it’s all about…

As part of the movie launch, there is a worldwide blog hunt being conducted. You can join the Dragon Tattoo Blog HUNT - an internet wide scavenger hunt tied to the feature film launch of bestselling book The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. Win great prizes – freemovie tickets, books, movie soundtrack, posters and more. To join the contest, start at the beginning of the HUNT by visiting  www.dragontattoofilm.com/contest for full details and the first clue. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo is in theaters near you starting March 19th.

If you’ve landed here by following a clue from another blog, this is what you’ve been searching for…

THE NEXT CLUE:

After fantasizing about her husband’s funeral, this blogger decided she was going to fix her marriage no matter what. Her ‘project’ is to find her fairy-tale ending with humor, raw honest, karma and a lot of rolling around in the hay. See for yourself if she’s living Happily Ever After.

Now, go forth, hunt, read, watch, and, above all craft a great story…

You can learn more about Ed or check out his book at:

• http://thewealthyfreelancer.com/ – Read the blog & download the first 3 chapters
• The Wealthy Freelancer book
• Ed on twitter

[FTC disclosure: Ed is a friend of mine. He's got more hair left than me, so I may be a little jealous and that might affect my feelings about him and his book. Speaking of which, his book totally doesn't suck, but I should probably let you know he sent me a copy for free, which is almost as good as paying my mortgage. Well, it would be, except I rent. I guess I'm also feeling a little guilty now about asking Ed to pay my kid's private school tuition in exchange for this post, specially since she goes to public school. Ed may or may not also make great pizza. I don't know. But, if he sends me a free one chances are I'll eat it, and if I write a review, I'm hoping it won't be biased.]

Over the weekend, I had a quick twitter exchange with Tom Peters, the author of In Search of Excellence, Re-Imagine! and forthcoming book, The Little Big Things.

It started with the above tweet (that was meant as a joke).

Shortly after, Tom replied:

Tom brought up an interesting point…

And despite the fact that the last two companies I’ve founded have successfully served markets that are 75-80% women, to a large extent I agree with him. Women know women better, because they ARE closer to their clients than men will ever be. They can work from a place not of sympathy, but of empathy more easily. And I sense many women go about identifying and solving problems differently. More collaboratively, intuitively and experientially.

As Louann Brizendine, a neuropsychiatrist at the University of California, San Francisco noted in her book, The Female Brain, womens’ brains function differently on both a structural and chemical level. And, that too may well give an advantage when building businesses that serve the needs of women.

Does that mean ALL men should be banned from designing products and experiences for women?

Of course not. There are exceptions to every rule. Some men tend to connect more easily with women. To have an ability to understand the emotions, desires, frustrations, needs and pain points better than others. Some work intensely hard to place themselves into the daily lives of the women they seek to serve. Some do it well enough to create extraordinary solutions for women. But, it’s been my experience, those men are very much the minority.

Most who try end up either failing or creating solutions and experiences that effectively serve women. But, the goal of a business, product or experience should never be to “effectively serve” a market. It should be to blow peoples’ minds. So, the question, when you look at men-built businesses that serve women, is not so much whether they’re making a buck and satisfying a need, but whether a women could do it better.

Now, you may already vehemently disagree. And, I’m still pondering how I feel about this issue when it comes to products and experiences.

But, even if you buy into Tom’s and my assertion, there is a place where it gets really murky…

When you move the conversation over to the realm of artists and solo-professionals.

Should male authors not write for female audiences because they just don’t get how to craft prose in a matter that’ll get deep enough into a woman’s head, heart and soul to hit home?

What about music? Or, paintings? Must one be a Celine Dion or Ann Rea to touch womens’ souls?

And, what about fashion? Or therapy?

Should male therapists yield the field to women when it comes to treating female patients?

Slippery slope here. So, I’m curious…

What do YOU think?

———Awakened Shout Outs————

Reset Business – You’ll be able to find Tom and I (he’s speaking, I’m playing), along with Michael Eisner (yes, that Michael Eisner), Seth Godin, Gary Vaynerchuck and Anna Bernasek at the very cool upcoming Reset Business event in NYC on April 20th.

Lemonade - If you’re one of the 8 people who still hasn’t seen Erik Proulx’s amazing mini-documentary, Lemonade, go check it out now.

Small Business Summit – If you’re in NYC on Tuesday, March 16th and you’re into small biz, think about swinging by this 1-day event (yes, I’ll be hanging out there, too, along with SmallBizTrends.com founder, Anita Campbell).

———————————————–

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Nothing quite like the power of a good funeral…

My Valentine’s Day started with a funeral this year. My wife’s 93 year old great uncle left us. He was a lawyer, one of the good ones, passionate about the process and the people he served. He was at Normandy…and came home.

An inspiration. A beacon of quiet strength, he helped people without reservation. Sometimes with advice, other times with money or just the knowledge he was there should he be needed. He was married for 60 years and until the day his wife passed, they’d never be seen together without holding hands. And, he was a strong father. Always present, always sharing his passions.

Truth is, I didn’t know him that well. But, the stories that were shared at his ceremony reinforced what I’d always sensed. He was a good man.

And, it made me wonder, what story I want told about me when my time comes.

At only 44 years old, that may sound like a macabre question to ask.

But, really, it’s quite powerful. Life-affirming. Because it strips away the crust and exposes what matters.

I love marketing and entrepreneurship, but honestly, I don’t think the story I want told is “he was a great marketer.”

Part of the story I do know.

Others parts I won’t until I’m further into my journey. But, here are elements of book 1.

He was…

• A legendary father, husband, brother, son and friend
• Someone who left people better than he found them
• Someone who believed in the potential for greatness within all
• Someone who moved through life with a sense of awe, wonder and adventure
• Someone who challenged others to come alive, then helped in the endeavor
• Someone who was compassionate, even-handed
• Someone who gave a damn with all his heart
• Someone who owned up to being human
• Someone who was deeply intuitive
• Someone who knew how to laugh
• Someone who built people up
• Someone who loved deeply
• Someone who was present
• Someone who created
• Someone who gave
• Someone who led
• Who truly lived

Those are the chapters. So far…

My task is to fill each with stories worth telling and retelling for generations to come.

Because, as George Bernard Shaw said:

I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no brief candle to me.  It is a splendid torch which I have got hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brithly as possible before handing it on to future generations.

Nothing is permanent. We have one shot at telling our story.

Owning up to that isn’t dark. It isn’t macabre.

It’s a gift…

I wonder…what story are you writing with the way you’re living your life?

Ever hear stories about animals eating their young and wonder…WTF?!

Bank voles do it, house finches do it, wolf spiders do it (I honestly don’t what any of those are). Many species of fish even do it. And, they don’t just eat all their young, they actually decide who to munch and who to suckle.

According to a study by Hope Klug and colleague Michael Bonsall at the University of Oxford (reported in LiveScience):

…several factors contribute to parents developing a taste for their own offspring. In some cases, cannibalizing their own young puts the same evolutionary pressure on the eggs that a predator would: the faster the eggs develop, the greater their chances of survival.

Cannibalism was also found to increase the parent’s reproductive rate by apparently increasing mate attractiveness…

Klug said filial cannibalism could be a way to root out offspring that take too long to mature and therefore require a little too much parental care—this strategy would conserve the parents’ energy for subsequent, faster-developing batches of young.

“They initially overproduce offspring and then later remove some of the inferior offspring,” Klug explained.

General competition within a species for resources may also limit parents to the amount of energy and time they can spend raising their young, so they force their eggs to grow up fast or get eaten.

See the entrepreneurial analogy?

Entrepreneurs often get so emotionally-wed to their babies, they lose the ability to make good decisions.

They cling desperately to ideas, projects and businesses they may have had justification in bringing to life, but once alive, quickly prove to have far less potential than other projects that might engender equal passion, yet have a whole lot more runway.

And, the more they keep splitting their time, attention and nourishment on the entrepreneurial runts, the less time they have to nurture the golden opportunities.

That’s not to say runts never make a comeback…

But in a world where attention is quickly being split on an atomic level and we’re getting desperate to know where to focus and why…we might want to take a look back at the animal kingdom and ask if and when it makes sense to cull the herd.

So, what do YOU think?

Feeling hungry?

In the last two posts in this business strategy series, we’ve talked about the monthly membership business model and the innovating-without-a-net business strategy as they play out in the offline world. In this final post in the series, we’re taking names, busting more myths and moving these business strategies online.

Some of you caught on to what I was really doing in the last two posts…

In our conversation about the monthly membership business model, I took what is often held up at the ultimate low-risk, cash-flow positive, set it and forget it business strategy and showed how it often creates a false sense of stability that lures you into complacency, leading to a slow, insipid decline.

Then, I took one of the most fear-inducing business models—innovate-hustle-pray—and showed how, done really well, it can be game-changing, highly-profitable, and far exceed the potential of the set-it-and-forget-it model.

But, truth is neither model is without it’s risks and challenges.

Both business strategies can be executed in ways that make them either powerful or pitiful.

It’s all about what you bring to them that makes either work or not work.

Fact is, the monthly membership business strategy can make it a whole lot easier to sleep at night AND build a tremendous business IF you keep your eye constantly on theinnovation ball and proactively work to avoid the complacency trap.

And, the innovating-without-a-net business strategy can be disastrous and lead to non-stop stress IF your business is built largely around a commodity service or item that doesn’t rely all that much on innovation (though, if that’s the case, you’ll inevitably end up in a margin-killing price war at some point anyway). Or, if the thought of constantly coming up with ways to blow peoples’ minds doesn’t sound fun to you.

So, let’s bring the conversation and the business strategies online now.

And, look at a few examples of online monthly membership models, see what new challenges arise in addition to complacency, take a deeper look at a few that actually work well and explore how.

After that, we’ll move over to the “innovating without a net” side and look at how that often unfolds online. And, we’ll explore a new platform that’s allowing pretty much anyone to set up an a la carte menu of courses that can be taken either standalone or as part of a certification or other credential.

And, maybe, just maybe, we’ll end up somewhere in the middle…

Online monthly membership websites: the good, the bad, the truth

When we move the monthly membership model online, the innovation/engagement challenges remain, but are expressed differently.

New challenges include:

• Technology integration,
• Forum moderation/constant engagement,
• Feeding the content/feature beast,
• Opportunity for access often creates an expectation of access that’s unrealistic
• Easier to duplicate/rip off than offline models because price of entry so low.

But, along with those challenges come new opportunities vs the brick and mortar membership biz:

• No physical space to maintain,
• System wide upgrades all the time,
• Opportunity to expand market reach globally
• Ability to scale in a fraction of the time
• Ability to scale with a fraction of the cost
• Substantially lower fixed costs/overhead.
• Low up-front investment
• Lower risk of loss

In the world of online membership sites, there are two major divisions:

• Education and
• Services/technology solutions

On the education side…

Every year, thousands of people launch membership sites promising to deliver constantly-updating training materials within a particular niche. The vast majority of these sites quickly fizzle under the unexpectedly massive burden of content creation and member engagement.

It’s very easy to underestimate what it takes to feed the content and engagement beasts.

The people I know who’ve seemed to really figure it out have moved away from indefinite commitment based sites and:

• Capped the membership period to a fixed term - instead of offering a perpetual membership experience, they offer an X month course. From a psychology of persuasion standpoint, this makes sense, since people are generally more willing to commit to something with a defined start and end point. Plus, it makes the content delivery and engagement burdens easier to identify and keep up with on the owner side of the equation.
• Switched to a library & syllabus model - While most of those folks started with monthly billing, time-released content delivery and ongoing forum moderation, many have now switched to a library & syllabus style of content delivery. They offer access to a library of content upfront and provide a syllabus to help navigate the content, while preserving ongoing support and engagement in the linked forums. The downside of this used to be that someone could download the content from the full course in the first week, then stop paying. And, that is a risk you take, which is one of the reasons most who use this model also…
• Switched to a one-time up-front payment - Many have switched from a monthly subscription payment model to a one-time up-front payment…which probably says something about retention when payments were monthly, too.

Great examples of content-driven, fixed-term membership sites that work (read “make a boatload of money” are

• Teaching Sells – Teaching sells literally teaches you how to build a business around what Brian calls interactive learning environments.
• SEO Book – SEO Book teaches you how to drive a lot more traffic to your website via organic search.

The content libraries are updated regularly and interaction is provided continuously. And, both now operate on a one-time (or limited installment) fee structure.

In fact, I’m having trouble thinking of more traditional online membership sites that have:

• Stuck with the monthly content delivery and pay structure,
• Endured for extended periods of time with fresh, high-value content (more than 1 year), and
• Aren’t scammy get rich quick sites.

I’d offer up the example of ThirdTribe.com, but even though I am really enjoying and finding value in that community, it’s too early in the game to fit the above criteria.

If you guys know of some that satisfy the above 3 criteria, feel free to share links in the comments (but don’t outright spam if they’re not really qualified).

On the service/solution side of the monthly-subscription business strategy…

Moving away from pure educational content as the basis of online membership sites, technology solutions are tailor made for this type of business strategy. You can allow people access to a hosted solution that allows 24/7 access from any browser. And, this format actually facilitates innovation, because you can constantly improve the solution without having to worry about compatability and tech issues that can be major drags with traditional “installed” software upgrades.

37Signals is a great example of this. A number of you brought up the example of 37Signals and their highly-successful monthly-billing business strategy in the comments. 37Signals created a set of online productivity and collaboration tools that have gotten rave reviews. I’ve used some of them myself. And, they’ve also become known for consistent, envelope-pushing innovation and features, while always keeping their user interfaces super clean and easy to work with.

Thing is, when you move over to the solution side, we aren’t really talking about “membership” sites any more, we’re just talking about subscription billing.

It’s a subtle difference, but one that signifies a very real shift in the burdens involved. Because, when you remove the content delivery and engagement burdens of more traditional “educational” membership sites, that allows for a lot more time to be spent on internal innovation that often facilitates the introduction of additional or enhanced solution features.

What about innovating without a net online?

There are a million ways to sell one-off products and services online without monthly-billing. That conversation is way too big. So, let’s stick to the high-value educational content side of the equation, so we can make a more apples to apples contrast.

The alternative to membership sites for high-value/educational content has largely been:

• Paid ebooks,
• Fee-based webinars and teleseminars,
• One-time pay, single or multi-session trainings.

And, a lot of people make a lot of money with them. But, it is becoming increasingly difficult, because so many people now give away those same offerings as part of a lead generation funnel for larger products, like membership sites, services, events or fuller courses.

In the early days, much of the free stuff was garbage (and that still holds true today), but increasingly, companies are giving away very high-value content as a way of proving value, building credibility and priming the reciprocity pump in anticipation of paid offers.

A great example of this is ClickEquations.com, a paid search marketing firm that gives away some really high value information and training videos on PPC marketing in anticipation of then selling you the good stuff.

So, these days, to really shine with one-off online content, it’s got to be extremely well positioned, provide extraordinary value and preferably be launched into a large, existing community.

ArtoOfNonconformity.com blogger, Chris Guillebeau, has ton a tremendous job of this over the last two years. He’s built a hyper-loyal community, then served up a series of what he calls Unconventional Guides, which are a blend of high-value/low-priced ebooks and mixed-media courses that solve very specific problems.

Examples include:

• Frequent Flyer Master – a ebook-based course that teaches you how to score a treasure-trove of airmiles, often without setting foot on a plane
• Art and Money – a mixed-media course that teaches you how to earn a real living as an artist, and
• $100 Business Forum – a 28-day private forum based course that teaches you how to launch a small business on a shoestring budget

If you’re not following how Chris is building an empire…start now. You’ll learn tons.

On the “playing big” side, there’s also Institute For Integrative Nutrition.

Started as a live training and certification program in NYC for health counselors with a focus on nutrition, demand for the school’s programming exploded. This led them to launch a highly-innovative distance learning variation that blended mixed media courses with scheduled online discussions and forums. Doing this expanded their reach dramatically, opening up their training and certification program to a 24/7 worldwide audience.

And, here’s a secret, I am now in the process of developing some very cool new training to be announced very soon. At first, I was looking at online membership sites as a prime business strategy.

But, there a new kid on the distance learning block you may want to know about that can make presenting your paid content easier.

Prfessor.com, launched in 2009, boasts a turnkey distance learning platform that any content creator (that’s you) can use to host, register, manage and deliver online courses for a fixed monthly fee ($49.97 as of March 2010). And, it’s pretty slick, because it let’s you not only roll out individual courses with a variety of content formats, it also lets you set up what can essentially become an online institute or certification program with a complete listing of courses. Or, as they call it…an instant academy.

I’m very tempted to use this platform for my next adventure, so stay tuned.

Wrapping up…

In the end, what I’ve hoped to convey in this 3 part series on business strategy contrasting the membership/subscription versus one-off models is:

• There is no one perfect model for every venture
• With every seemingly perfect model, there’s always an underbelly. If you can’t see it, look harder. Be sure you know and are willing to dance with the challenges before you build a business around it
• Think seriously about whether you’re comfortable spending your time on consistent innovation, content creation, member/client engagement and solution evolution. Different models shift the burdens between these elements.
• Either way, it’s getting harder and harder to justify the investment, risk, market limitations and oversight needed to operate a brick and mortar business IF there is an online analogue available.

Stay tuned for some upcoming series’ on small business, persuasion, marketing, copywriting, launch strategies, sales and more.

And, if you missed the first two part of this series, you can find them here:

• Business Strategy: The Recurring Income Trap
• Business Strategy: Innovating Without a Net

As always, would love to learn from your thoughts and questions in the comments below…

It’s no secret I believe bloggers should be free to earn a living at their craft…

Which is why it bugs me when someone questions my right to mix a relatively miniscule volume of features or content with a blended commercial intent into what I do here.

Warning: Rant ahead!

I’ve said it in my recent posts on the NY Times putting up a paywall, bloggers getting paid for their content, my take on the errant ways of the free brigade and plenty of other posts. My friend, Dave Navarro has killer post up called, When Free Gets Ugly, on the topic.

We’re not here out of the kindness of our hearts.

Yes, we love to create valuable content and conversations. Most of us come alive through the opportunity to make an impact. But, it also takes a substantial amount of time, energy and passion.

And, most of us are also really fond of paying our bills and honoring our responsibilities to ourselves and our families.

So, I’ll say it one more time…

Online or offline, someone in the chain of creation and/or consumption always pays.

There is no free, only the perception of free…because somebody else is paying.

In the newspaper and magazine worlds, the readers pay part and the sponsors and advertisers pay part. Sometimes it works, other times not.

In the blogosphere, which has grown out of the ethic of free, for years it was just assumed the blogger would pay. Always with their time and often with their own money and lost opportunity costs. But, then folks, readers like you, started to realize that creating consistent high value content, conversations and experiences takes a boatload of work. Work worthy of compensation (well, sometimes, lol).

Still, bloggers have been VERY hesitant to charge readers for the right to engage with their content.

So, instead, they’ve…

Developed ways to fund their efforts that don’t require revenue from readers.

Some put up adsense ads, others put up banners, still others accept money up front for posting reviews. Some use blogs to build a platform, a community that then fuels indirect or “off-blog” revenue like consulting, events and paid content offerings and solutions. That’s my main revenue model for this blog.

Yes, I confess, I don’t just do it for the love of people and pixels.

And, it’s why I offer a variety of ways join the community and even nudge people toward email with prompts at the end of my posts and a subscription lightbox that’s been specially scripted to be friendlier to a blog-community, only show once and, even then, not until you’re done reading a post (fyi-we’re currently fixing a setting that unintentionally made it show at other times),

Still others try out services and products and, if they find genuine value in them, become affiliates and pass on their honest opinions and experiences. On occasion, I do that, too. It’s an itty bitty part of the thousands of hours a year I put into sharing with this amazing community. And, it’s an itty bitty part of how I make money with this blog.

Non-hobby bloggers spend an insane amount of time creating content and conversations.

Nobody’s forcing us to do it, we LOVE doing it.

But, it’s an effort we could never sustain were we to go all purist and say, “I’m not worthy of remuneration…FROM SOMEONE.” Because, for most, time spent blogging is time taken away from other projects, ventures or jobs that would bring in income. So, I’m good with the fact that, over the last few years, a growing array of vehicles, strategies and opportunities that allow companies and individuals to support bloggers have evolved.

I don’t hide that, in fact, I pretty much evangelize it.

And, if anyone has trouble with idea of bloggers adding a modicum of commerciality to our blogs in an effort to put food on the table for our families, while also serving up a large volume of genuine value…I’m happy to receive a check in the mail instead.

Oh, and for the 99.99% of you who get it, who show up, write us bloggers the most wonderful emails, share your thoughts and ideas and tolerate our wacky desire to in some way leave you in a better place, while putting earning a living…

…you blow us away and honor us with the gift of your presence, your energy and your attention every day.

Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU!!!

Rant over.

Have a lovely day.

.

Sometime around the middle of last year, I hired someone to do an SEO audit on my blog.

SEO, by the way, stands for search engine optimization, or…how sexy google thinks you are.

The verdict…ACK!!!

That was literally what the final report said. My keywords were all over the place, posts went in a million different directions, my headlines were written entirely for humans, not google bots and reviewers. Oy vey, I was an SEO trainwreck.

You’d think someone who’s been doing this for a few years would know better. And, in fact, I do.

I just don’t love the process of “SEOing” my posts, so…I’ve ended up blowing it off.

But, I have a confession to make. Looking back…I wish I hadn’t.

Because I’ve now got hundreds of juicy, high-value posts in my archives that are drawing very little organic search traffic. Not because they’re bad, but because I never bothered doing the basic “on blog” SEO stuff that sets your posts up to become search-engine traffic magnets.

Then, along comes Scribe SEO…

It’s a new service for Wordpress bloggers (that’s me) that claims to make the process of optimizing your posts for search engines about a bazillion easier. Fun, even. Plus, the guy behind it is my friend, Brian Clark, of Copyblogger fame, and he puts out good stuff.

So, I decided to give it a whirl…

And, the thing is, even though I’m an affiliate for the product, I paid full price for it myself. Because of the potential value to me. Because, if it worked as claimed, it’d help me do something mission critical that I’ve had a lot of trouble doing myself.

Scribe SEO under the hood…

Scribe SEO is a simple to install Wordpress plugin that allows you to click one button and have a draft post thoroughly analyzed for SEO. Within seconds, a report appears on the screen that gives you an overall score out of 100, then suggests very specific things to change before publishing in order to maximize the SEO impact of the post.

Translation for non-SEO-geeks…it tells what to change to make google love ya.

I was going to post a bunch of screenshots showing how ScribeSEO works, but truth is, they’ve already done that, and quite artfully, at the Scribe SEO website.

Just follow this link, click on “Bloggers,” then click “Take the Tour.”

But, what I will do is share my personal experience as I began to run the plugin on my posts.

They can be summed up in one word. “OY!”

Apparently that SEO expert I paid to audit my blog (she rocks, btw), was right. My posts blow SEO chunks. My scores were down around the 40s and 50s out of 100.  And ScribeSEO plugin report lit up like an 8 year old’s eyes at a candy store. Decision time.

What really made this worth the investment, though, is that the ScribeSEO plugin didn’t just tell me what was wrong, it also suggested suggested keywords, link additions and other tweaks to fix it.

Remember, though, it’s still up to you to take ScribeSEO’s advice. And, here’s where you need to be careful. Sometimes it’s fairly easy to do what Scribe SEO says, make a bunch of quick changes that make google dig you AND keep your readers humming happily along. Other times, it’s not so easy, because it messes with your language, tone or message.

So, you’ve got to decide whether you want to lose out on potential SEO value, but keep the personality in or bump the SEO optimization and potentially lose a bit of zip.

In the end, I find Scribe SEO really useful, largely because:

• It’s inexpensive for what it does (they have a 72% off special if you register by Friday, Feb 26th)
• It pushes me to examine every post and make the tweaks I’ve blown off for years.

It’s kind of like my own private SEO cop.

And, as I mount an effort to drive a lot more organic search traffic, trust me…I need the help!

Remember, though, Scribe SEO will optimize your post for search engine traffic and help you to write headlines with great anchor link text for backlinks…but it won’t automatically get you those backlinks that put you over the moon in google’s eyes. That you have to do yourself.

So, go check it out.

Test drive it and see if it feels right for you.

[Affiliate disclosure: As I mentioned above, I am an affiliate for this product. That means, if you click on over to check it out and end up buying it, I'll get insane amounts of money hand-delivered to my numbered account in the Cayman's and be one step closer to retiring and living my life out in a sarong with beaded hair...what's left of it (huge apologies for the mental image)]