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Old August 11, 2002, 11:40 PM
Don Alm
 
Posts: n/a
Default I ben der...done dat. Here's some suggestions.

Sarah! Hang on kiddo! MANY "true" entroopeneers (MYSELF included) have been exactly in the shape you find yourself in.

Here's a couple examples from my illustrious past;
I preface this by saying "I" cannot take orders from another human bein. I have "refused" to "look for a JOB" when I've been "temporarily without cash"! WHY? Because I KNOW who "I" am!

Case 1)
Arrived in small mountain town after horrendous divorce in Chicago. Had $200 left (TO MY NAME) after train ride from Denver.
Got off train...walked across street and got a "flophouse room" for a week ($15) (Now had $185 left)
Asked flophouse clerk where the FANCIEST BAR was in town. (At 3pm in the afternoon in ANY fancy bar in this great country of ours. you WILL find the "movers and shakers" of the local business community. You'll find CEO's, Sales people and the IDEA people of companies..."taking an early break, before the "5pm crowd of worker bees"!)
Went to bar. Overheard conversation of new manager of new radio station talking with his investors about "some ideas" of HOW they'd get some "audience share" AWAY from the existing station.
All ideas I heard (too me) were crapola. Then I remembered a promo a station in suburbs of Chgo did that was VERY successful.
I went to office supply store and bought a 3-ring Binder and a few sheet protectors and a "magic marker".
That evening I created (with $5.69 worth of materials)....a modified Radio Promotion program I called, "BUMPER BUCKS"!
The next morn at approx 9:30am (With a "cold-call", let em get their first order of business over with but...ya gotta reach em BEFORE their FIRST appointment, which is usually at 10)...I walk into the radio station offices and ask to see "Allen". Receptionist asks , "WHO are you with? I tell her, I'm with Advantage Marketing and I have a promotion idea that COULD bring his station a LOT of listeners!"
(Sarah - the ONLY REASON WHY the "media".... Newspapers, TV, Radio stations...exist, is because of ADVERTISING! If their production does NOT bring eyes and/or ears...they CAN'T sell ads!)
(Jerry Seinfield was making TWO MILLION dollars an episode in his last year because of ONE REASON;
the advertising people selling ads for his show, could sell LOTS MORE than $2 million per show)
So..."Allen" asks me to "come in". I show him my "Bumper Bucks" promo (with my $5.69 promo package) and how it WILL bring listeners to ANY Radio Station...and he reacts as many of these "hi-browed execs" react who have just seen a GREAT IDEA presented in a sort of "schlocky format" (Just a black and red magic marker)...he says, "Well. I'm going to have to take this to my "board" for a "review"!
HORSEHOCKEY! HE is the "board" and "HE" has just "reviewed" my ingenious promo program which he "thinks" could bring desperately needed listeners BUT he doesn't know will work for sure because I have NOT given any "PROOF" that this promo has worked anywhere else before.
So...I bring out "all my sales guns" and hit him with, "Allen! I am offering this program to YOU ...FIRST....BEFORE I go across the street to the Station that's been here for 30 yrs. I thought YOU would want FIRST shot because YOU are the new guy in town! Well, so be it....thanks for your time....I go across the street." (and I start putting my pages back in the 3-ring binder and he grabs my arm and says, "HOLD IT! I'll take it!"

So...Allen paid me $2500 for the program...I sold 40 local businesses on the program at $300 each for 13 weeks....and I walked away with about $12,000 in my pockets.

And...venture #2 that cost me zilcho to get going;
I'm operating a "Fax Advertising" biz (in 1993) with my new puter and WinFax pro (sending Advertising Faxes "People who have Subscribed to my Fax-Ad service" when I come upon a Deli owner who tells me he's ALREADY sending out faxes to his list of customers who gave him their fax #'s to be faxed his Daily Specials. I ask him if "I" could take over Faxing to HIS list for $20 a day and he says, "Do It"!
So...no investment on my part other than a PC, a Modem and a Fax program and I've got someone committed to paying ME $200 every 2 weeks to send out Faxes to HIS Fax #'s.
Now...multiply that by 3, 4 or 20 Deli's and you've got yourself a BIZ with LITTLE investment!

You can also set up a "Permission Email Club" where you simply ask local restaurants and other biz to let you place your "Email Collection" bozes where their customers fillin a form and drop in the box. You send emails to these people an charge the restaurants and merchants a nice chuck o change each month for YOU sending emails to THEIR EXISTING customers.

Hey! I hope I've given you "something to CHEW ON" here.

Thanks for reading.....Don Alm

> In a post a little further down Michael Ross
> posted this, “Imagine this... you are out of
> work, have no money coming in whatsoever and
> cannot get any on credit cards or in any
> other way. You are too proud to go on
> welfare, have no products to sell, no
> customer list, refuse to get money selling
> your body for sex, refuse to get a job
> working for someone else for a wage and you
> refuse to sell any of your possessions.
> Knowing what you know now, who you know now
> and having the resources you currently have
> at your disposal, what would you do to get
> yourself back on your feet before you ran
> out of money?

> You only have $1,000 left.”

> Well this very closely fits where I am right
> now. Only I don't have $1,000. I left my job
> awhile back because I was having panic
> attack caused by flashbacks of childhood
> trauma inflicted by a neighbor, and the
> corresponding depression also made me very
> ineffectual at my job as well.

> I moved back in with my parents to save
> money while I got myself put back together.
> But my car, filled with all my belongings,
> broke down halfway to where my parents
> lived. Getting that repaired took a big
> chunk of my money. I moved in with my
> parents. Then a tooth of mine broke in half
> and I had to a dentist for that. And then
> shortly thereafter there came a strong
> suspiscian that I could have cancer...and
> just about the rest of my money paid for
> tests.

> Emotionally I'm better but still not
> entirely stable. I'm afraid of getting
> another job because I've found that going
> into uncontrollable panic in front of
> customers and co-workers isn't exactly fun.

> I've been reading the posts here. Several
> months before I had my "breakdown"
> I had bought Robert Allen's "Multiple
> Streams of Internet Income." (I take
> heart from the story in that about the guy
> with manic-depression who is now a success).

> The money gets tighter (I've now borrowed
> money to help pay my car insurance, and
> already had $1,500 credit before this all
> began). And I keep thinking, "What can
> I do to make money?"

> I've done a few small things in the past
> month or two to make money. A yard sale got
> me almost $150. I bought a few small things
> to list on ebay that ended this
> weekend...the profit from that only about
> $20. This month I've managed to buy and
> resell a few things to people I know and
> made about $40. And I've invested in putting
> stuff for sale in an antique/craft mall like
> store. The money I pay to have stuff there,
> i.e. rent, is really cheap (I've compared it
> to others)...but so little of my stuff sold
> last month I again only made about $20.

> When I first started selling stuff through
> this store I told myself I was crazy because
> it seemed like an insane thing to do when
> you're broke. And I talk now and then of
> leaving...because supposedly it's an insane
> thing to pay rent for something like this
> when you're broke. But something happens
> whenever I am there, or when I start talking
> about selling stuff there, or make plans on
> how I might posssibly increase my chance for
> profits, etc. I start getting excited...I
> actually start smiling, I start feeling like
> there's a reason for living.

> But I am so stressed about the money, and
> the feelings of panic that surface now and
> then. For me Michael's "pretend"
> challenge made to get people thinking is so
> similar to where I am actually at. And I
> don't know if I can do it. I don't know if I
> can get past the barriers of thinking like
> I've always had (as someone who has always
> been an employee not an entrepreneur).

> I've always wanted to be in business for
> myself...but I've always listened to
> conventional wisdom that said you should
> have so much money saved before starting any
> venture. And it takes money to make money.
> It seems crazy to do anything when you are
> broke...but I also don't know if I'm capable
> of holding a job at this point.

> I flip back and forth between being
> determined to find a way to support myself
> to thinking that I probably am not capable.
> Did I mention that I've been incredibly shy
> most of my life? So while I've thought of
> doing things such as clean people's houses
> I've gotten too nervous to do anything about
> it such as even let people know that I'm
> available. Desperation may soon help me
> overcome that. :)

> Anyway, I hope y'all don't mind my really
> long post. For me it has actually been kind
> of a relief and release to write so much of
> this down. I hope to follow some of the
> suggestions on this board and hopefully come
> up with a solution(s) to my problem.

> Thanks.




Some of my work from home programs.
 


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