The Next Crooked Furrow - Pt 2

Hello! David J here again bringing you more of the steps on my journey toward financial independence.

Gee - we're getting these posts a bit more often now! Cool!

In the last post, I promised a URL to my "squeeze page". Before I do that, let me explain: this will be most useful to those in the Chicago Metropolitan area. The squeeze page takes you to an ivitation to a local meeting - remember, we talked about that last time: this group is based in the western suburbs of Chicago. They also have an office on the City's northwest side, in Indianapolis and in the Greater Rockford area.

So, that said, here's the link: www.DJEDevelopmentGroup.com

The video is short, about five minutes.

The "squeeze page" asks for your name, your phone number and your e-mail address. It's o.k., I won't be calling or e-mailing you without your permission. See, when you enter that information, the first message you get is by e-mail asking permission to continue to correspond with you. Seems redundant, but it IS required by law that I do it that way.

Click on the "authorize email" link in that message and you will receive a "Thank You" message from me. In the "Thank You" message, I tell a bit more about the group and the folks who lead it. Don't want to spill the whole thing here. This is a blog, and that's information for folks who choose to pursue a business relationship with me and with the group.

Still, you can unsubscribe at any time. I don't plan to do e-mail campaigns or any of that.

If you do choose to continue with me, we will be in touch regularly by phone, e-mail and in person, if you're local to the Chicago suburbs.

What I am doing a bit different from most folks in the group who choose to use the squeeze pages is that I'm using their ability to do on-line "relationship building" via e-mail. I've had a good two years of exposure to on-line marketing, though this is my first attempt at on-line relationship building, known in the larger business world as "CRM": Customer Relationship Management.

This may catch on, depending on the response I get. So, please use the comments space here on the blog to voice your opinions. I'd really like to know your thoughts to help me build this business further, hopefully with some of you alongside me. We can earn, learn and grow our businesses together.

Here's the best part: this group holds a workshop every month, usually the third Saturday. For $50, whether you join in any other aspects of the group or not, you get a whole day of content and learning, from 9 to 5 with a 90-minute lunch break. Note that the focus of the day is content, not a sales pitch. For $50/month, you can't beat the learning opportunity. Others would charge hundreds for a single-day presentation.

Otherwise, the group meets on Thursday evenings and Saturday noon time for the business presentation, and then on Friday at noon time and Monday evening for a follow-up, question and answer session.

This is what you don't get from the "gurus" who do the 90-minute sales pitch webinars: a place to learn and to build an on-going relationship with the people in the group. As we go along here, I'll point up more of the differences, but that's a big one, and even though you're getting this blog for free, this little bit of knowledge can be worth many, many millions of dollars to you.

If you've read my earlier posts you know that I DO advocate listening to the sales pitch webinars. In the first place, they're "free". You're paying to run your computer and have internet access anyway. This is one way to make it productive. If you listen to enough of these "gurus" you can pick a LOT of good information out of their presentations. You just have to get past the sales pitch to find the information.

Here, this group doesn't offer up sales pitches. The Saturday Workshops are all content. In fact, when you come, bring a fresh pad of paper and a good pen or two to each one because you WILL want to write down a lot of information. You won't want to run out of paper or have a pen run dry on you.

Here in this area, I know of only one other group which holds "no sales pitch" meetings. The group is known as "the WCRT", for no special reason. The letters don't really mean anything according to the group's leader, Ryan Steele. Ryan is a successful investor in own right and does do one-on-one mentoring, for a fee. The WCRT meets the first thursday of every month, except where that falls on a holiday. Take a look at the WCRT website for more information. Every month features a speaker - pure content, no sales allowed.

Having the group for support and making local contacts is by far the most valuable resource any group can offer. The "gurus" don't seem to get that - their presentations are pure marketing from start to finish - just being brutally honest, no offense intended.

As to part 2 of the latest crooked furrow, I dispatched my first direct mail campaign this afternoon. 556 pieces to two carrier routes in a local zip code. We'll see what kind of response they draw. Untargetted direct mail gets the lowest response rate, usually. So, I'm guessing less than 1%. Out of 556 pieces, maybe 2 or 3 people will pursue it. I'm hoping to do better, of course.

We'll talk again soon!

Take care - be well!

Much Success!