Hope are having a nice week and looking forward to the weekend.

First thing I want to say is that I cannot go forward with the Trader Day meet that I mentioned in an email a couple of weeks ago.

Unfortunately the interest was low and I don’t think it will be worth your time to attend.

If I can get more interest in a meet then I will sort it out but for the moment I am afraid it is “on hold”

So, apologies for that…

Pat Adams Retirement Seminar:

Got a letter from someone who had been reading an article on BizOppsUK.com and this person wanted to correct me on a few things I have said there.

Can I just say that I am always happy to correct anything that I place on the site so if you do see an error, please let me know!

Back to Mr Adams, I have posted the comment on the blog so if you have had similar experiences to the mystery writer, please let me know:

Some Controversy About Pat Adams Retirement Seminar Package

Big, big opportunity:

Back in April I went to the Entrepreneur Weekend seminar in Birmingham and met lots of property investors and internet business owners.

It was really, really good and well worth the time and money to attend.

You can read more about the seminar here:

Entrepreneur Weekend Seminar – Birmingham – April 2007

As you will see, it is a work in progress or a “whip” as they used to say in the pizza factory I worked in when I was a student.

I’m half way through the Sunday write-up so please check back in a week or so and I should be further along.

Anyway, at this particular event were two young internet entrepreneurs called Paul and Andy. Their presentation was about “domaining” i.e. buying and selling domain names for profit.

As is pretty typical of me, when I find something I am really interested in it kind of takes over my life and I do a whole load of research.

This is a booming market so make sure to read the blog post I wrote detailing what I have found about domaining as a business:

Could This Be The Next Big Money Maker?

John Cummuta:

Finally, there’s a new review on the site here:

Transforming Debt Into Wealth by John Cummuta

Have a great weekend.

Thanks,

Ben

UPDATE:

Shortly after I sent out the above email, I got another email about the Pat Adams subject:

“This may sound uncanny, but since I mentioned to you about Pat Adams not sending me all the software etc and my website being taken down, he emailed me yesterday and said he will be sending me the software and will get my website put up online again. If this happens, then I have to take back what I said, but it has gone on over a long period of time that I have been waiting for the promised software. Having seen your article about this on your site, I will be interested to see if any of the others who attended his retirement day have had the same problems as me….keep up the good work.”

Interesting…

Back in 2006 I put up a page about Pat Adams and his retirement package.

Although this offer has long since expired, the page still exists:

Pat Adams Retires

This write-up has a lot of details about the contents of the package that Pat was offering – which in all fairness was very impressive.

It’s been quite a while since I looked at it but today I received some DVDs that I bought from eBay and written on the back of the thank you note was a letter:

“I looked at your website, and the facts about Pat Adams’ retirement package are not entirely true.

I bought it, went to his retirement seminar day and was promised loads. He did give us a shopping cart website to sell his stuff, and I added lots of my own info, manuals/CDs but I discovered 3 weeks ago he has taken it down without letting me know and he is not answering my many emails.

He promised us the next 2 seminar DVDs etc and I only managed to get one lot of stuff by continually pestering him for it. I still haven’t received the newsletter software he promised for the 1st seminar.

I feel badly let down, but I don’t have contact with other people who went to the retirement day to see if they have had anything from him or not”

Now in all fairness to Pat, emails can go astray and therefore remain unanswered. Years of continuous spamming by morons means that many people have over-zealous spam filters which will gobble up the most innocent of emails.

However, as this person was kind enough to take the time to write to me I would like to ask anyone else who bought this package to get in touch and let me know if they received everything that was promised.

I have just bought a package which promised several expensive bonuses which I have yet to receive and so I can understand how frustrating it is. The person who offered these bonuses is currently not responding to emails or help desk tickets and there are many people who are starting to worry.

So, if you did get Pat’s retirement package, please do get in touch and let me know how you found it. You can find my email address on the main site at:

http://www.bizoppsuk.com/feedback.php

“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…”