In this issue:
1) The Merchant Account Mafia - What you should know.
2) You're a Poet - Why writing doesn't have to be hard.
3) The Stomper tried to kill me.
4) Success stories.
The Merchant Account Mafia.
Remember the old parable about when a child would burn their hand on
the stove they'd never do it again?
Or how about the ever so eloquent words of George Bush - "Fool me
once, shame on you. Fool me twice, uh, can't get fooled again".
There's some truth to both of those statements. Having said that, I
ALWAYS prefer to learn in a proactive way. But once in a while, you
gotta get spanked to learn a lesson.
Ever since I've been applying Brad Fallon's techniques from Stomping
the Search Engines to our Yahoo! Stores, our Affiliate sites and our
Information Product sites (likeapromedia.com) we've seen business
literally boom. In fact, our traffic and our sales have increased so
much that just the other day...
...we were nearing our $100,000 monthly limit for one of our
merchant accounts. Now, we've had this account since the very
beginning of A Squared's existence. And since I'm a loyal person,
it's the ONLY account that I don't have with Christine Phillips of
Advanced Credit Systems...
Anyway, I thought that a phone call was in order. I wanted to make
sure that we were being pro-active by letting our Merchant Account
Banker know that we were apt to blow by our limit this month.
Somebody tell me that was the right thing to do!
Even though the average, intelligent, thoughtful business person
would THINK that communicating with a vendor can do nothing but
enhance a relationship, in this case, it almost cost me $20,000 in
cash.
Here's what happened.
The minute I told this broker (let's call him Brutus) where we were
in sales, he DEMANDED that I send him $20,000, overnight, or he was
going to freeze my account.
So I said "Let me get this straight Brutus - You make your money by
taking a piece of every dollar I make".
Brutus - "Yes".
Andy - "You haven't had to do anything to maintain this account for
the last 4 years"
Brutus - "That's correct".
Andy - "And, the more I make, the more you make because..."
Brutus "...I take a piece of every dollar you make"
Andy - "So, now that I'm making more, and you haven't had a charge
back from this account in 9 months, and you have never had to
provide me any service, you want me to send you $20,000?"
Brutus - "Or I will freeze your merchant account".
That's Ghetto.
Mid way through the conversation, I scribbled on a piece of paper to
Audrey "Get Christine on the Phone now and tell her to open up 2 new
merchant accounts - tell her it's an emergency and I'll call here
when I'm done with this {Explicative Removed}"
And to Brutus, I said, "Okay - what's your address?"
Moments later, I'm on the Phone with Christine (it's awfully nice to
be able to talk to the owner of the company.) She went into action.
I mean, WOW!
One business day later, I had 2 new merchant accounts, which I
promptly switched my shopping carts to. I then jumped into my car,
zoomed to the bank, stopping at the Rita's Water Ice on the way, and
knocked on the door to the branch president's office.
He said "Hey Andy! What's up?" I handed him his slightly melted
Cherry Water Ice, and proceeded to tell him to divert incoming funds
from the old account to the new account. I also transferred all of
the money out of the old account to the new account. And he added a
little bonus to the old account as well.
Patting Neil on the back, I zoomed back home, where a message from
Brutus was waiting for me.
I grew up in the Ghetto. And whenever I would get into a "Tussle" I
would always start to shake. I had to have Audrey dial the phone
number to Brutus' office.
Surprise surprise, not only had Brutus illegally seized $2,100 of a
batch settlement, he also tried to charge my bankcard for an
additional $4,000 (the limit of the card's daily transaction).
I grabbed an emergency menthol cigarette, and proceeded to tell
Brutus that he just lost a million dollars a year in business. I
explained to Brutus that there was no account for him to steal from,
that my personal Banker had flagged all electronic transactions from
his company into his bank, and I hit send on my fax machine, which
was pre-loaded with a little surprise.
30 seconds later, Brutus had a nice little letter from my Lawyer
explaining to him the error in his ways, and how he was liable for
up to 5 times the amount he stole from me if he didn't return it in
48 hours.
Brutus mumbled something, sighed, and said that he'd send me a
contract for the return of my money.
What's the moral of this story? Well, there are a few things you
need to keep in mind as you grow your business.
1. The more money you make, the bigger of a target you become.
2. The most important people in your business are the ones that help
you make it work. Go out of your way to create a great relationship
with them so you can call on them when you need to.
3. Just because a Merchant Broker deals with Banks and Money doesn't
mean that they cannot be sleazy. A lot of these people can be real
hucksters.
4. Don't mess with an Internet Entrepreneur that grew up in the
Hood.
I was lucky, and prepared for this weasel. The minute he hemmed and
hawed about the transactions, I set things into motion. Sure, I
bribed Neil with a Cherry Water Ice - Sure, I know Christine real
well, and sure, my lawyer travels with a Black Berry that is always
connected to the Internet but...
That's why they are my Banker, Lawyer and Merchant Account Broker.
I can't tell you who to bank with, nor can I tell you which law firm
to have represent you, but I can tell you that Christine Phillips
from Advanced Credit Systems pulled my Heiny out of the fire with
such great class and effortless speed that I will tell you, once
again...
...no matter what kind of Merchant Account you need, this is the
lady to have it with.
Call 1-(800) 814-3163 and get to know her. Ask questions
about your account. Let her know what kind of growth you're
expecting. She's not only a Yahoo! Store, or any kind of eCommerce
Merchant Account expert - she's a valuable source of Merchant
Financial information as well.
--- You're a Poet and you don't realize it ---
About a week ago, a fella by the name of Mike called me and asked
for a Refund of Online Store Profits. I was on the phone with
another customer, so I asked Mike if I could call him back. After
about 4 hours of phone tag, we finally hooked up.
Mike was very cool, not tentative or haughty. I asked him why he
wanted a refund and his answer really caught me off guard.
Mike said that he didn't like to write. In fact, the prospect of
creating the sales copy for his store was so daunting that it made
him uncomfortable. But what really freaked him out was thinking
about writing a newsletter to his customers and subscribers...
Now, please understand, Mike is an articulate, well-spoken guy. He
CAN write, he's just not into it.
So, we talked for about 30 minutes and ended up with a solution. And
I thought that I should pass that solution onto you.
First, the type of writing we do as eCommerce Store Owners is far an
away different that the type of writing (if you could call it that)
that I do for this newsletter. I happen to enjoy stream of
consciousness writing, and frankly, my business, as varied as it is,
always gives me something to gab about.
But when you're writing to a customer that's visiting your web site
or getting a newsletter for a specific industry's product, things
are a bit different.
Here are a few tips:
1. When you're describing a product to a visitor, tell them about
the ownership experience. Meaning, just because something is blue,
burns 400 calories an hour, or comes with an optional de-odorizing
dispenser doesn't tell the customer what owning it will be like.
You need to help the visitor visualize how this product is going to
affect their life. Now, I don't mean to be dramatic, and this is
easier said than done - but that's your goal. People buy things from
your store because they fill needs that they think they have in
their life.
Whether it's to be thinner, less smelly, a better cook, a snazzier
dresser, better looking, more wealthy - whatever they want, it's up
to you to tell them how that product could help them achieve that
goal.
2. WIIFM. It's not a radio station. It stands for "What's In It For
Me?" That's the mentality you need to write to. I'm not saying that
visitors surf around with that attitude, but that kind of WIIFM
writing sure does get their attention. Telling a visitor how your
product will benefit them is the first step in closing a sale and
developing a long lasting relationship.
3. Only write when you have something to say. Like you, I get 30
newsletters every day. I read about 4. And the ones I read are the
ones that come every week or so apart. Usually, a week is a long
enough time for something interesting to happen to the average
newsletter author. And usually, those authors have something
interesting to say. Use that as an example. If you have something to
say, do it. If you don't - don't publish just because it's time to
publish.
That's not a lot, right? I'll be honest; writing is a process, like
anything else, that you get better at with practice. I know what
it's like to sit in front of your computer and try to spin product
descriptions so they sound good. When I finally realized you need to
be thinking in terms of "User Value", that is, how does this product
help your visitor achieve something, my writing got a whole lot
easier.
--- My Own Frankenstein ---
I've created a monster. It's called Stomping the Search Engines. And
the last 2 weeks, it got loose and nearly killed me.
In addition to the Merchant Account Drama that we dealt with, the
kind people on the Online Store Profits newsletter list have sold
the Stomper Out...
...completely.
And they did it in 48 hours.
So, the last 2 weeks since it's announcement have been a veritable
fire drill of production. Even though we were not scheduled to ship
until the 4th, we still managed to ship 5 days early. We're also
shipping units every day because people keep ordering the dang
thing!
We could have worse problems I suppose.
The bottom line is, we're caught up with the majority of the orders
- and we have huge shipments going out on Monday and Tuesday. I also
found out that UPS is about a day behind when they send their
electronic shipping notification, so if you did order, yours may
already be in the shipping cue.
Because of the demand, and because we got caught with our pants
down, I pushed the future ship date on new orders to August 13th.
And, because the Stomper is once again a Pre-Order, I've extended
the Pre-Order price to August 12th.
If you haven't ordered yet, you can go to www.instantseoexpert.com
and get the pre-order pricing. Just so you know, we've quadrupled
our production capacity - so it's unlikely that we'll need to extend
the pre-order price again.
You should see my house. I'll take some pictures and post them.
-- Success Stories --
Finally, I've been getting a high volume of Thank You phone calls
from people who have quit their jobs and started living the Internet
Entrepreneur's lifestyle because of Online Store Profits. I don't
know if it's because the weathers' nice, or people have been in a
good mood, or what - but I've been getting about 5 a week.
I asked 2 of the folks if they wouldn't mind being interviewed on
tape so I could share it with you. They happily agreed.
So, over the next few weeks, I'll be posting some audio files from
the interviews that I conduct with these folks.
I have to say, their stories are just great. One of them told me
that he started his store when he was on unemployment. While the
clock was ticking away on his benefits, he managed to get his store
open, replace his income, increase it, and then tell his wife to
quit here job - because they got so busy. He did $60,000 in sales
last month.
The other story is from a customer who was one of the first people
to purchase Online Store Profits back in the day when it was called
Yahoo Store Profits. His name is Brian, and we had a terrific
conversation. During our call, his wife yelled "Who are you talking
to?" He said "Andy". And she screamed "ANDY! THANK YOU!"
He's gone on to diversify his business with affiliate programs and
now gets so much traffic to some of his affiliate sites that he's
making a $200,000 + a year living with pay per click ads, Google Ad
Sense, and affiliate programs.
So, just as soon as I get my head above water, I'll get those
interviews up and downloadable.
These are just ordinary people - They don't have any special skills,
and in fact Brian had been rooked by some scam artists before he
found OSP.
I want you to hear their stories because it has been my experience
that people often find success in a different ways. They follow the
same general advice, but it's applied differently according to their
own lifestyle.
What makes their stories so extraordinary is their desire and
commitment. All they really did was tough it out under difficult
circumstances, learned, failed forward, and ultimately, changed
their lives.
And in the grand scheme of things, that's all it really takes to
succeed.
Think about that the next time someone tells you it can't be done.
Till next time!
Andy Jenkins
