“I received an email you sent out recently regarding Tim Lowe’s ‘How to make £15,000-£25,000 per month from cheap little web ads’.

I had previously purchased the dvd course and having sourced a product and set up a web site i began doing some free advertising and got the odd one or two sales.

I was wondering if you have had any experiences regarding placing classified ads in any of the papers Tim mentions on the dvds, I am at a stage where i would like to advertise to a larger audience but am a little put off by the fact that these papers can be slightly difficult to deal with ie, wanting references etc.

Have you had any success with them or can you recommend alternative places to advertise?”

Thanks for the query but I would just like to ask: have you contacted any papers at all?

If you are selling a biz opps type of product then I will assume you are talking about advertising in the Mail on Sunday or the Sunday Times. I get these papers every week just to check out the new adverts in the Business Opportunities section.

Anyway, there are always new adverts coming and going - including many from people who seem new to the “game”. I would be surprised if they had references which they could use…

When I placed an ad in Exchange and Mart, the sales person I spoke to laughed when I asked if he needed any references!

He just took the money and placed the ad which was good for me because I am not sure that I could’ve got the references required.

You can read about my experience from that advertising here:

Advertising Offline to Drive Traffic to a Website

When you bought the package part of the deal was that you could ring Tim to get an evaluation of your website. I would suggest that you take him up on the offer and ask his advice. After all, if Tim Lowe offers you a consultation about advertising in the press and you have questions about the same topic - take him up on it!

As for other places to advertise, there are loads.

Google AdWords, Yahoo Search Marketing, biz opps ezines, banner ads on relevant websites etc

Or you could search out potential Joint Venture partners who will spread the word for you in return for a commission on the sale.

First thing’s first, though, I think you should take Tim up on his offer of a consultation.

And if the idea of joint ventures interests you, I know of a great guide to getting JVs:

The Sara Brown Ultimate Income Plan

Before I start talking about today’s topic I want to state that I have never done a direct mailing campaign.

Of course, I have read many business opportunity manuals which deal with direct mail and all are adamant that it is a very lucrative field to get into - providing you do it correctly.

So, if I was to take the plunge and spend several thousands of pounds sending out a mailing I would make 100% sure that everything was perfect.

Judging by the amount of direct mail I receive, I am on several big mailing lists. I get loads of business opportunity sales letters through the post every week. Most are very well packaged and written - whoever sent them took the time to make sure everything was perfect before they got the printers to start preparing their mailings.

Every so often, though, I get a sales letter which seems to have slipped through the proof-reader’s net.

It makes me wonder why somebody would take the time to prepare a mailing, spend a whole load of money to send out several thousand direct mail pieces and basically risk a load of money but neglect to check their mailing for mistakes.

Take for example a recent direct mail sales letter I got - I won’t say who sent it or what business opportunity it was trying to sell but this was from a big name in the business.

First page of the printed letter said:

“In the 5 minutes it takes to read this website…”

So, obviously this has simply been lifted from a website and printed onto A4 before being sent.

Onto page 9:

“…I have shown you [proof] and you can see the actual national press articles that have been written about me…”

Problem is that the articles and proof mentioned here is freely available on the web but not in this printed sales letter so it makes no sense and this sentence should have been removed because the reader cannot see the proof mentioned here.

There were more little slip ups in the text but the best mistake was saved for the back page, on the order form it says:

“Please rush me [name of biz opp] for an unbeatable £347″

And then a couple of lines down it says:

“I enclose a cheque/postal order(s) to the sum of £397…”

and then:

“Or, please debit my credit/debit card with the sum of £397…”

In just 4 inches of paper, the price increased by £50 and probably confused the vast majority of people who may have been ready to order.

Had this been an email campaign then it is pretty easy to rectify - you can just send a follow-up email pointing out the mistake and apologising.

However, direct mail campaigns are expensive and a follow-up here would cost the same again, doubling the cost of the campaign.

The point is - if you are going to mail out some sales packages make sure that everything is 100% correct. Read through the pack thoroughly and then get a couple of other people to do the same.

Better yet, find a proofreader to do it for you and you can avoid huge mistakes like putting the wrong price on the order form!

Subscribe to a newsletter from Streetwise Publications and you will always receive a couple of sales letters thrown in the envelope.

Usually these are business opportunity related offers but there can be the occasional strange offer for a weight-loss course or a speed camera detector.

I’m not surprised that Streetwise do this, it’s good marketing. If you are receiving a newsletter from them then you are already a customer and so related offers for other products are likely to be well received.

So, in with this month’s issue of Passive Income Newsletter (PIN for short) I got a sales letter for a new product which is described as a “back to basics betting method”.

If there’s one thing that sells well in the biz opp world then it is a system involving horse racing.

This one is called the “Lazy Lay Quick Cash System” and has been written by someone called Bill Stratford.

Bill claims that, starting with a £200 bank, he made a tax-free profit of over £47,000 in 2006 by turning the tables and becoming a bookie.

He even provides a run-down of his results he got from laying horses to lose in 2006 and during this time he only had one losing month when he lost £685.60 in October.

His best month was December where he made a massive £21,853.20 in profits spread over 24 bets. Pretty impressive figures…

This system isn’t cheap at £197 but it does come with a guarantee: If Bill’s system has a losing month in the first 3 months after you purchase, you can get a full refund provided that you have followed the system correctly and you send in your betting records to Streetwise.

I’ve purchased a similar laying system in the past but was unable to make it work correctly simply because I had to be glued to the PC in order to trade during a horse race. This was so that I could minimise losses by betting in play.

Not sure if you need to be available during races with the Lazy Lay Quick Cash System. It doesn’t seem that way because Bill says in the sales letter that:

“…you only need to invest a few minutes each day to make this system work for you, scan your morning paper, and place your bets…”

Sounds great but I’m not sure if I’m going to buy this one - not yet anyway!

Bill Stratford is correct in one respect:

“…You know it’s hard to pick winners, so it’s not surprising you never see a poor bookmaker. After all, picking losers (which is what most punters do every day at the bookies’) should be easier…”

I’ve had quite a few emails asking for any feedback on the recently advertised “US to UK Deals” seminars from Andrew Reynolds and Tim Lowe.

One came through this week:

“I have had two or three mailing from Tim Lowe & Andrew Reynolds about their USA - UK Deals recently where you purchase licences for the DVDs you can sell on supposedly at a big profit. You know the one, Andrew is over from New York with a great deal for us and Tim Lowe will look after you at the UK end.

They want about 5k for it …you have probably seen this offer. Have you had any feedback on this opportunity? All seems a bit to good to be true but I am aware they are both respected in this field. Do you know anybody who has ever joined up with them and made the sort of money they often talk about?”

I must admit that I have never attended any of these types of seminar but I have seen good feedback from them.

A hour or so after I sent out the latest free business opportunity email newsletter I got the following feedback from one of the subscribers.

The comment was:

“My partner and I both attended Tim Lowe’s Seminar in November re. Andrew Reynold’s US-UK deals and can say that they do deliver what they say. We’ve received the resale rights on a number of DVDs and books and are at the moment in the throes of getting our first product launch up and running. I must admit, though, that it’s not for the faint-hearted. There’s a lot of preparation and research to be done - it’s definitely not a “get-rich-quick” scheme. Nevertheless, I am hopeful of being able to bring in a decent income from it very soon. Maybe it won’t be too long before I can write back with some positives - time will tell!”

Thanks for the response!

If anyone else would like to add any feedback, please click on the link below which says “Comments”

Like anyone who has ever bought a business opportunity in the past, I am now on a lot of mailing lists.

Of course, this means I get loads of sales letters through the post.

I always keep the vast majority of these sales letters because know I’m probably going to need them in the future.

Over the weekend I was sorting through my big “swipe file” and putting all the duplicates to one side.

For example, I am on Streetwise Publications’ mailing list and I must’ve received 8 or 9 mailings for the Pentatrade system. I’m not surprised, the Pentatrade course costs well over £2,000 so it makes sense for Streetwise to spend a great deal of money advertising it.

Anyway, whilst I was going through my swipe file I decided to tot up how many offers Streetwise Publications have sent me since I got on their mailing list.

With my first purchase from them coming in January 2006, I have only been a customer of theirs for around 13 months.

However, in that time Streetwise have sent me sales letters for over 30 different products.

The cheapest?

A tie between John Harrison’s “How to Stop Working and Make a Million Pounds Instead” and the “Drivers Survival Handbook” - both £19.95

The most expensive?

Easy - that accolade was taken by the Insider Signal trading course which cost an eye-watering £2322.

Second most expensive, closely following the Insider Signal, was a similar course - Pentatrade by Hugo Lawrence - at £2287.

Very interesting, especially if you are an information publisher.

Streetwise are basically showing us how to make huge profits - make sure you have plenty of products to sell to customers after their first purchase, the “backend“.