Douglas Yates, Product Launch Manager

I was reading to see what Nancy Scott over at The Digital Nirvana blog, thinks will be the next mainstream marketing trends.

Her picks?

1. QR Code Explosion
2. Icky Picky Mail.
3. Direct Marketing and Social Media Integration.
4. Email Is NOT for Everyone.
5. IMB Innovations.
6. Ever More Personal pURLS.

Read the full posting for explanations of each of the six and for some great links.

QR Codes ; I believe the sky is the limit on these. For the creative these crazy bar-codes can do incredible things.

Just a short entry on goals or new years resolutions. I am a avid follower of setting goals and I know thru experience they work. But here are a few tips;

1. Make them realistic – Its OK to shoot for the stars , but you need to be able to reach them in the time frame you have allowed.
2. EACH GOAL NEEDS A PLAN ON HOW TO GET THERE!!! – Probably the most important, you have to take the time to think thru a plan on how you are going to reach the goal. No Plan No Path No Goal.
3. Don’t put your goals in a drawer – they have to be in your face every day – along with the plan.
4. GO FOR IT – it only takes 21 days to change a habit – that’s less than a month to get on a new path towards your goals!!!!!

I just got back from Jeff Walker’s PLF 3.0 (Product Launch Formula) live event in AZ. What a great event. it is rare that I attend an event where I meet so many quality people. People that are actually putting their learning into application. As a Product Launch Manager I have helped numerous organizations launch their products and have had great success. I met so many people during the 3 day event that have had the same, if not better success. It was encouraging that in a time like we are having in America that people are still exceeding their dreams.

Jeff Walker is the KING of product launches on the Internet. NOBODY has ever reached his success – he invented this niche. I can say confidently that because of Jeff’s technique and training that people regularly do 7 figure launches and at least 1 $100M internet business has been created. Most events like these are usually SELL SELL SELL, but at Jeff’s events it is always LEARN LEARN LEARN from the top GURUs in their niches. I am amazed that he can put together the talent that he does. You know the saying – if you want to be successful at something then copy those that are successful (or something like that ). Jeff invented the internet product launch and all the BIGGEST launches have credited him for their success. You hang around cool, successful people eventually something is going to rub off on you. I am proud to stay that I have been personally trained and mentored by Jeff Walker and every launch I participate in uses his exact techniques/formulas. So I want to say a public “THANK YOU” to Jeff Walker and his team for providing invaluable education and mentoring.

If you have a great idea and a great list – I can help you generate more money than you could ever imagine.

Let me tell you that doing a product launch is hard. Especially if you haven’t done one before or seen one done before. I am so thankful that I have “passed” Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Management program (and currently enrolled in his PLF 3.0 training program). Without this knowledge (and the experience of doing several product launches) this business would be a nightmare. There are 1000 moving parts and keeping them all aligned and moving in the right direction is not an easy task. I have owned and ran a very successful IT consulting company (Drake Dosh, Inc) for over 20 years now and adding a product launch division to my company was a natural progression. In fact we are doing less and less IT consulting and more Product Launches. The older I get, the more I learn to let the experts handle what they are good at and concentrate one the important critical items.

I am a hard core entrepreneur and I always think I can do everything myself. BUT – as I get older I realize I don’t have to (or need to ) do everything, Let the experts fly – let them do what they are good at – pay them for what they are worth and leverage your time. I learned from the famous Mr. Trump, attract and hire the best and you will be successful. It all works out in the end. Let me give you an example; I have an business associate that came from extremely humble beginnings and even thou this person is a multi-millionaire they still try and get services for free or as cheap as possible (it’s ingrained in them, they can’t help it). I can’t tell you how many times I heard from this person that they got 75% off the normal retail cost for a service and the person/company they hired, either did a lousy job or never finished. YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.. A service provider will always resent being paid so little and sub-conscientiously are unable to give the job their best. Hey, I’m all for finding a deal, but when it come to having someone handle a critical area of a business process or a product launch – HIRE THE BEST AND PAY THEM WHAT THEY ARE WORTH. First, you will always get their best (cause you are paying for it), second, you don’t have to continually check up on their work (saves you time) and when they are done – it’s done, you don’t have to go back and fix it. This allows me to concentrate on the important items and leverage my time – doing 20 things in a week instead of 2.

I know what you are thinking – I can save so much $$ doing things myself. Let me tell you, if you continue to follow that trail you will reach the end of the trail absolutely exhausted and alone. Please believe me – IT ALL WORKS OUT IN THE END. Plus, if you share the work and wealth (by paying what someone is worth), you are following a couple natural or heavenly based laws and that always produce dividends.

Let me bring this back to a Product Launch. Some clients complain about a product launch manager’s upfront fees and giving up a small portion of their revenues from a launch. If a potential client is complaining about this, then they don’t understand the worth of my service – so I either walk or convince them. As a product launch manager, if I’m able to increase a clients sales by 1000% and they are paying me 25% of that, do the math – they are making more $$ with me than without me. That’s what I mean by – IT ALL WORKS OUT IN THE END.

One more real world example of this; In one of Trump’s books he states that before he finishes a new building, he finds and hires the best real estate agents out there and he pays them more then the normal commission rates to lease out his buildings. Does this cost him more in commission fees? YES; Do most of his buildings get 100% leased, faster then others? YES; Does this reduce the holding cost of a building? a BIG YES. Pay additional $1M in commission fees, but save $9M in holding cost – IT ALL WORKS OUT IN THE END. Look at the big picture, not the pennies you are trying to save and be 100% more productive than you are now. YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR.

Product Launches ARE hard, but for the people (like myself) that know what they are doing – Product Launches are HARDly ever unsuccessful (and they are fun).

I just completed the Glazer-Kennedy Super Conference and I have more than $5000 worth of additional services I can now offer my launch clients. This was one of the better conferences I have attended. It was focused and all the speakers/presenters had synergy. I will be implementing what I learned – tonight.

Other cool observation. My latest launch was for a Dr. (DC) in Alamo, CA, for his patented Amino Acid Supplement called Total Amino Solution (www.CompleteGuidetoHealth.com) I have been taking TAS for over a month now and took it all during the conference. one thing I noticed is that instead of being tired and worn out at the end of the conference (like always) I have just as much energy and focus as I did when it started. I didn’t go into brain overload. Pretty cool (I also have lost 36lbs over the past 45 days).

What a crazy past few weeks. I got canceled by my autoresponder because of a bug in their system, our fulfillment house delayed us 3 weeks due to technical errors on their side and my father had a stroke. CRAZY. This is what I learned – persevere always and have a backup/contingency plan. When my autoresponder (and shopping cart provider) told me they were canceling my account I thought my world was ending – $25K and 200+ hours down the drain. Even when I proved to them that is was due to a bug in their reporting system – they still wouldn’t turn me back on. Finally after a very tense call with one of the main dudes I was able to get everything turned back on and proceed with our launch.

Jeff Walker was right – everything will go wrong at the last minute. But all is good now. We are up and running and taking orders (I have a backup autoresponder setup). One really cool thing is I was able to hire Ryan Ringold to review the site and our marketing and he gave it a thumbs up (with some minor tweaks) and was able to outline a killer PPC and keyword campaigns that ROCK!! Ryan is great – here is his web site; http://ryanringold.com/

Looking forward to starting our next customer – stay tuned.

If you need energy, to be able to focus better or need help with your health, check us out at www.CompleteGuidetoHealth.com

PS. My dad is doing better – the Amino Acid product (Total Amino Solution) is helping a ton!!

PRE LAUNCH has started – very excited about this one – client is extremely happy so far. If you know anyone that wants to JV a patented quality food supplement to their list let me know.

Click on the book and check the site out.

Total Amino Solution – Amino Acid Supplement – www.CompleteGuidetoHealth.com

I landed this latest product launch venture in the same way I get all my business – word of month. I have been running my own consulting and business advice business, very successfully, for over 25 years now and I have generated millions in sales by word of month. Doing to great job for someone and they tell someone else, and so on…. No huge marketing campaigns or advertising budget (or even a web site till recently) — it pays to let people you know what you are doing and that you are good at it.

One day I’m eating lunch with a friend, just catching up. I am telling him how I just did this small internet product launch of an eBook that shows people how to buy and sell cars on eBay Motors. During this lunch 2 sales came via email – that more than paid for the lunch. I thought (and so did my friend) that was sooo cool – making money eating lunch!!!

We’ll he went home and told his wife – his wife knew of a chiropractor in Alamo, Ca that had a new revolutionary food supplement product and needed help with his marketing. So she ask me if I would meet with this doctor. I said no problem and we met. I listened to his story and proceed to tell him everything I knew, at the time, about how to drive people to his web site and expand his sales.

He liked everything I said and then ask me to handle launch of this new patented product to the general public (the product was selling well into the chiropractic and psychology fields). We hammered out the contract details and within 4 months – with basically only ME as a resource – We have fully implemented;

All that while keeping the Dr. focused, excited and to the terms of our agreement.

One person, using currently available tools, implementing all that in 4 months – I am pretty proud of the accomplishment.

We had a well known health & wellness author and a very successful (8 digits) cosmetic product seller review the copy and sales process. They stated that they haven’t seen our technique used in the health and wellness arena and that this should take the industry by storm.

We start the pre launch on Friday.

Getting ready for the next launch…

Hello My name is Douglas Yates.

I am a Jeff Walker trained Product Launch Manager and I am working on my third launch.  A huge launch with a Dr. in Alamo, California of a new revolutionary food supplement called Total Amino Solution.

I just finished an internal launch (just within my client’s company) of a custom Focal Compensation product deveoped with Microsoft’s Silverlight development platform.  I not only managed the launch, but I also managed the software development process using our offshore technology partner.

Selling more in one launch then a YEAR’s sales!!