Learning To Learn: How I Conquered The Complexities Of Internet Marketing

Looking back at my childhood, it’s amazing that I didn’t drive my parents completely insane. I never really grew out of the “why” phase that most pass over around the age of four. As far back as I can remember, I have had a perplexingly strong desire to understand the functions of the world around me and it’s always colorful remembering how that manifested.

One summer afternoon in my early teens I remember riding in the car with my mother. We were skipping between errands while fighting the insanity of Atlanta traffic when I found myself looking at her feet. In this moment I realized just how much she was doing to control the vehicle within which we sat as it rocketed down the highway. How was it that one person could simultaneously do so much to accomplish a task that, on the face of it, seemed simple?

I began asking my mother every question that entered my mind. Was it difficult to drive? Can I talk to her while she’s doing it? Why do you only use one foot to manage two pedals? What are all of the controls for? How many do you have to manage at once? What’s a ‘blinker’?Knowing that I was only a few short years from being old enough to get my driver’s license I started to wonder – was I capable of driving a car?

What a preposterous thought! How was it that I was doubting my ability to do something that I had never done – or even attempted – when everyone I talked to continually reiterated how simple it was to learn? How did the lack of understanding regarding the process and the uncertainty of how I could learn it myself combine to almost immediately result in self-doubt? What a useless notion that was!

It was years later, in my last year at college, that I should have remembered this moment. A few months following the end of a long relationship I had met someone new. She was third generation Swedish and still maintained the amazing genetics that Swedish women are known for – blonde hair, blue eyes, and … big boobs. On our first date we kept things simple and went for coffee, but enjoyed each other so much that not fifteen minutes after we had parted ways had we already planned our second date the following day.

It was a promising new relationship and we learned more about each other every day. Almost exactly two weeks into the relationship I had one of those powerful food cravings for sushi. The human brain is a powerful thing and we all know how useless it can be to resist these cravings. Standing in the doorway to my bedroom I asked, “Are you hungry? How about we do sushi for dinner?” I realize now that I had projected my love for sushi onto my new love interest and all but expected the answer to be “yes”, but what I got instead was baffling…

ME: “Are you hungry? How about we do sushi for dinner?”
HER: “No thanks, I don’t like sushi?”
ME: “You don’t like sushi?”
HER: “No, I don’t like sushi.”
ME: “Have you ever had sushi?”
HER: “No, I’ve never had sushi.”
ME: “You’ve never had sushi, but you don’t like sushi?”
HER: “Yes.”

All I could manage to do was stare back with a look of astonishment. How could anyone be so certain about something they had never experienced? I had two directions I could have taken the conversation, but at that moment in my life however – I was only aware of one.

I started to question how she could know, with such certainty, that she wouldn’t enjoy sushi. I explained that I wanted to take her to the finest sushi restaurant in town – no one who ate there could possibly not like sushi. She declined. I explained that if, in the event that she actually didn’t like sushi after trying sushi, I would take her to any other restaurant of her choosing. She declined. I explained that there were types of sushi that didn’t taste like fish, and some that didn’t even have fish in them. Still, she declined.

In the end, I was persuasive enough to convince force her to come with me for sushi that night. As we talked, (me completely oblivious to her severe discomfort with what sat on her plate) she spent ninety minutes picking at a vegetarian California Roll (rice, avocado, and cucumber) without actually eating any significant part of it. Throughout our relationship we never again went for sushi – one of my favorite foods. While I could have presented the option for sushi in fifty ways that were less forceful – I wasn’t adept enough at communicating at the time. When you boil it all down, I broke up with her two and a half years later because (I thought) she was close minded and refused to address challenging situations that were destined to become (and did become) major issues (a tale for a future blog post). If I had known then what I know now, I would have recognized that to be the case and it would have saved the $10,000 I spent on a custom engagement ring.

We can’t go back into the past to make different choices, but we can learn from it and make different ones in the future. While I “educated” her on the questionable validity of her commitment to disliking something she hadn’t ever experienced, it served only to make her defend that position and become more entrenched in her beliefs – even when, had the option been presented differently from the onset, her position might have been much different. It was years later that I discovered the other direction I could have taken our conversation about her disinterest in sushi.

To this day, I still love exploring my surroundings, my understanding of the world, and most of all – myself. It was by listening to an audio program with Jim Rohn where I was introduced to one of my favorite methods for self discovery, conflict resolution, and effective interpersonal communication. Jim explained how educating someone on the invalidity of their beliefs only serves to strengthen their stance on the matter – even when they know they’re wrong. He suggested instead taking an alternative approach.

ME: “Have you ever had sushi?”
HER: “No, I’ve never had sushi.”
ME: “You’ve never had sushi, but you don’t like sushi?”
HER: “Yes.”
ME: “Isn’t that interesting…”
HER: “What’s interesting?”
ME: “I just find it interesting that you don’t like sushi even though you’ve never had sushi.”

By using the statement “isn’t that interesting” I would have been able to lead her to question her own assumptions without disagreeing or saying that she was wrong. When you attack people’s beliefs it’s human nature for them to defend them – even if they weren’t strong beliefs to begin with. This is one of the foundational principles in Dale Carnegie’s legendary book ‘How To Win Friends & Influence People’ – something I discovered after the relationship ended. While there were times in my life when I told this story in criticism of her “lack of common sense” – it was with the same frame of mind that I had assumed I wouldn’t be able to accomplish the complex task of driving a car all those years ago and the same frame of mind that kept me from traveling the world until just last year.

It was through experiences like these that I began to realize I was more far more capable than I had previously thought. When I stepped back enough to question my own assumptions I would see, even in some tiny way, that they were shaky at best. By questioning my views of myself, as well as the world around me, I became empowered to discover my true limits. The more I pushed to find my limits, the further from reach they seemed to be.

While I had been marketing online for quite some time, it was only a few years ago that I discovered the world of ‘Internet Marketing’. It was new to me and made me feel like a newbie within a world I had already grown accustomed to knowing. The more uncomfortable something made me feel, the more I found myself charging towards it. I started my journey in the world of search engine optimization (SEO) as it was something I had always ignored or entrusted to other people.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is the process of affecting the visibility of a website or a web page in a search engine’s “natural” or un-paid (“organic”) search results. In general, the earlier (or higher ranked on the search results page), and more frequently a site appears in the search results list, the more visitors it will receive from the search engine’s users. (via Wikipedia)

Whether you’re an expert on the topic or completely unfamiliar with the process, there is one ultimate truth; search engine optimization is a complex collection of processes that must be intricately woven together in order to successfully achieve the desired outcome – quality traffic to your website or web property. Almost immediately upon jumping in I was overwhelmed with things like keyword density, link building, page rank, trust flow, and hundreds of other concepts that were entirely foreign to me. It seemed that every resource was saying “do this, but don’t do it too much … I can’t tell you how much is too much, that depends on a lot of stuff, but you’ll have to change your things every few months when the search algorithms change … and you need to do all of this while running the other aspects of your business.” I felt that just as I managed to get a hold of a new concept and conquer my overwhelm would a new, seemingly essential and previously overlooked, aspect come into view. I wanted to give up on a daily basis.

I’m thankful for my obsessive determination as it pushed me to persist. It pushed me long enough to hit my ‘big break’ which came in an unlikely form – a string of powerful realizations. While the break wasn’t massive revenue, partnerships, or publicity – it had an effect comparable to the combination of all three.

The first of these realizations was the reality of my situation. When I would get a sense of overwhelm from the expansiveness of the task at hand, the massive delay between action and my ability to measure results, or the sheer lack of a physical community that was able to offer support; I would notice my breathing became shallow, my shoulders locked up around my ears (causing a massive migraine when unchecked), and I would cease to be able to think clearly (not being able to carry conversations, let alone work effectively). This was a completely physically reaction to a situation that lived entirely in my mind. As it were, my girlfriend at the time was able to predict my level of stress based on the height of my shoulders and subtly incentivize me to lower them (took me weeks before I realized she was doing this).

It was within this stress that I saw every piece of the search engine optimization puzzle was actually quite simple – it was only the combination, mixture, and application that was overwhelmingly complicated. My solution: break it down. It may seem trite, but realizing that while the greater whole was overwhelmingly complicated, each individual piece was rather simple. I wrote “break it down” on a sticky note and every time I began to feel the onset of (what would likely be diagnosed as) a panic attack – I would take a deep breath, acknowledge that each individual piece is by nature quite simple, and I would find a way to break it down. Each time I went through this process I more quickly realized that the overwhelm resulting from (what I viewed as) complexity was merely an illusion.

The second realization came as a result of the first and was equally as simple. I began to see that while what I was doing was new, the pieces that were required to accomplish it were not. I began to see the world of Internet Marketing as a kitchen. All of the tools, utilities, and ingredients were diverse and proven. I didn’t need to invent something new, I just needed to combine them in a new way. With this I began to see that with every question I asked and answer already existed. The lessened stress from the first realization enabled me to see more clearly and ask better questions while this seemed to be a clear path to finding any answer.

Quite often my friends and family will message me to ask a question that (I think) is completely irrelevant to what I would identify as my experience. While the topic is often not something with which I’m familiar, I’m still able to find an answer and they think I’m brilliant as a result. Even when I tell them what I searched for and how I came about the answer – they still have the misguided perception that it’s an indicator of my intelligence. Truthfully, it’s my ability to detach myself from the need of the answer, break down the inquiry into pieces, and as intelligent questions of the almighty Google… and anyone can do that!

The third realization was one that, even after I had come to understand it, is something I still work every day to apply effectively. I continually look back on moments in my life and realize that I had failed in one of the most basic elements of effective communication – understanding the perspective of the other person. I’m not saying you have to agree with their perspective, just that you have to understand it and uncover as much as you can about how they came to feel that way.

This is one of the single most valuable tools in interpersonal communication and is an equally valuable tool in Internet Marketing. Like so many others, I had a clumsy start in Internet Marketing and was constantly left wondering why my conversions were so low … or absent entirely. It was when I took a step back from my disgust with the less-than-friendly comments people had left on my ad placements and started to search for the basis of their statements that I actually began to understand their perspectives.

I failed at selling because I was marketing products and services with my values – not theirs. It was when I started to look at the audiences I created, step back, and take the time to contemplate what they wanted that I was able to see success in my advertising. I had to acknowledge that these were real people I was talking to and they had all of their own unique interests, perspectives, and values. I came to develop a process for doing this effectively.

After creating the audience that I will be using on my new campaign, I take a moment to channel all my energy into uncovering the one thing that at least 90% of them would agree with in entirety. For example, some months ago I saw an opportunity to market an e-book that taught people how to increase their vertical jump on the basketball court. While most people marketing the product were advertising it to the people they thought would use it – I took a different approach. I wanted to advertise it to people who wanted people they knew to use it – translation: I wanted to market it to dads who wanted their kids to be basketball superstars (after all, they’re more likely to have the money to purchase it).

Using Facebook’s advertising platform, I created an audience of men between the ages of 25 and 39 who had children between the ages of 6 and 14. I then sat back to think of a message that would appeal to 90% of that audience and couldn’t come up with one – so I modified the audience. I added the condition that they had to have an interest in something basketball related. With this modification I was able to narrow my audience, but knew that not all people within it would have an interest in pushing their kids to be professional basketball players. After some time in my thinking chair I identified my message of “they don’t need to go pro, but you can help them out jump the other players.” I then used created my ad placements using different variations of this message to test the most effective way in which to deliver it.

By identifying my weaknesses and creating principles to strengthen them I have been able to build on small successes again and again. It’s with these principles that you too can effectively communicate with any audiences regardless of the format. Don’t however think that you won’t get value from creating your own. One of the most powerful processes is one of self-reflection. Look for opportunities to compete with who you were yesterday and you will see positive growth today. What principles will you create to augment your weaknesses?

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