However when I was considering doing so I must admit I did sign up for The Keyword Academy, mainly because I had read enough to know that keyword research was a must. It was so counterintuitive to me to start something without thinking about keyword research and I like the systematic approach (and more importantly the style) of the Keyword Academy. I think the high retention rate past the first month speaks for itself

They aren’t preachy or OTT. The online community is great and I would consider doing it all again before launching into anything. Having said that I find great information online and there are some good products like Market Samurai.

As you said it is time and effort to know where to find the good stuff, whether information, quality paid products and to filter out the scams.

I have a tertiary background up to masters level and have done some teaching, and whilst I knew what a good teacher was as a student, its a lot harder than just about textbook knowledge. It is something that involves a huge responsibility.

Lis I think you *are* a teacher. Does a teacher have to be teaching in a school or Uni to be thought of as a teacher. However you have built a relationship/rapport with your readers. That makes you the best teacher. Teaching is about explaining things in a straight forward way and eliminating jargon at the risk of eliminating some of the precision that jargon conveys.

i do know that you are far too ethical to sell and support a membership site and whether or not you choose to conduct courses in IM is just a personal choice.

BTW funny thread and hilarious comments….

I’d be thinking more about the excitement of getting to the $1600 point.

Agree Lis that if you know your product you will work out the best strategy for marketing it online. You can’t necessarily throw conventional marketing out of the window because of the advent of the internet although there is a lot of practical free information such as you have set out re: technical aspects like installing wordpress, article writing, seo etc etc

i don’t know whether Rob doesn’t want to reveal much about his target market, but agree that 200K spend seems a bit broad. A lot of people want to target ‘corporate’ or confine themselves to one demographic. It is nice to tie down the demographic as tightly as possible but not have too narrow a mindset. otherwise, as lis points out you miss out on the stay at home mums and others. I’d listen to Lis as she understands the culture of the internet, and the people who inhabit it. Agree that there is a lot to be said for online communities who just share information and help one another.

I suppose if you are getting advice from marketing companies and IP lawyers, this might seem a bit amateurish, however I have done my LLM in IP law and I can’t think of many IP lawyers who really think a lot about the practical and business challenges of operating online.

You must be talking about a lot of investment, as IP lawyers don’t charge lightly.

Although there isn’t any substitute for professional IP advice there is a ton of free information on the internet about IP related aspects of operating online. ‘

People who become experts in their area tend to become good enough experts through a combination of curiousity, listening to others and self-education, including sharing mistakes and successes.

I love these public spats which bring out the true character of a person. It is when they are angry when their true colors come forth.

I think you might (still unsure) find another fan in me

Yes, I will read through on that article, thank for sending me the link.

Can you take out some kind of flaw in WordPress as a product?

Copyblogger.com are not terribly good at doing brand management – you might want to check out the comments on another copyblogger product

Good luck with the product – will be interested to hear what your experience is.

In all these discussions, I have not seen even one proper comment from the team at Copyblogger in their defence. Makes me wonder whether they don’t have any believable argument, or don’t have the time to reply, or whatever..

It would be great if someone from Copyblogger.com could comment on this article in defense of their product.

As for me, I think I will go ahead and try it out. What do I have to lose, Brian just assured me of a 30 day money back guarantee..

- Their blog provides tons and tons and tons of free and valuable content on copywriting, based on solid principles of great marketers over the years, including Seth Godin, Robert Cialdini, Dan Kennedy, Gary Bencivenga, etc.
- They build trust by sharing freely of themselves for months and months without asking for a dime, and providing solid information that other so-called “gurus” charge for.
- I bought a course of theirs for US $97 called the “Freelance X-Factor” and I actually got my first client based on the methods I learned there.
- Brian Clark is not anti-Google or SEO…he’s totally pro SEO and Google…but in an ethical white hat way: providing honest, valuable content that people want to read
- They also sell some cool things like Premise Landing Page Software for only $85 ONE-TIME. As you know, landing pages are the best way to drive conversions for whatever call-to-action you have.
- All your readers could learn a lot just from reading Copyblogger’s free content. They could learn to be a good writer, a good marketer, and good at social media
- And let me repeat something I stated above: trust. Brian Clark and Sonia Simone have a high trust factor in the community because they deliver solid results, and they’re extremely knowledgeable about what they’re talking about.
- For full disclosure: I have nothing to do with Brian and Sonia…I just love their content…and their content can apply to any business, not just “selling online courses for a ton of money.” It can help plumbers who want a better way to market their business. It can help real estate agents (Brian Clark was a real estate broker in a past life – using educational content to market his business), it can help consultants like me who want to sell their consulting business….and I have successfully used the Copyblogger model (see my site in Spanish) to build a following of software consulting companies from Mexico and other Latin American countries who are interested in my consulting services (I help them market their business in the U.S. market, having been a successful sales and marketing executive in the past).

Some lecturers identify as Researchers, not Teachers, and they are not interested in developing curriculum and pluralistic pedagogy, which is inclusive of social learning practices. Participating in a community of practice (CoP) is not a priority, though students deemed suited to research careers may be mentored, especially if they are extending the research of the lecturer.

While Australian national policy looks to have 45% of under 35s holding a degree by 2015, many Researchers feel students are ‘buying their degrees’ or that ‘consumers today’ are simply butts on seats to meet funding requirements.

Distance between lecturers, TAs, admin and students is inherent in the power relationship. However, some academic cultures cultivate that distance to widen, simply by ignoring or avoiding CoPs or paying lip service to study groups and mentor programs, whilst not integrating principles into policy, curriculum and behaviours that are modeled to students (e.g., mocking another lecturer; ‘shutting down’ a student’s question; telling a PhD student to figure out how to do their own stats).

There is a push to make education much more open (free) globally by 2015, amazingly this shift to a virtual environment to deliver material and ‘draw out the learner’, looks to be snowballing into rich networks of collaborative multi-disciplinary peer support learning communities and CoPs. Beautiful.