Hi guys. Taking a cu
Will that be narrow enough? If broad, i've run out of ideas to find some more things to narrow it down to.
I hope to gather some thoughts from you guys especially those who have had similar struggles but have overcome them. Thanks in advance!
1 Reply
[2023-10-02 04:57:47 AM] : I’m not at all familiar with the audience of “affiliate marketers” but throwing this in case it is helpful: wouldn’t the subset that is specifically aiming for financial independence be active in FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early) community?
There are very prolific and successful content creators in that space, once I’m aware of are:
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/
https://www.madfientist.com/
I’m sure there are many more. Maybe you could find your audience embedded within the FIRE community? Or for that matter some other larger community? The course at one point talks about finding the audience that is not separate but embedded as part of a larger audience.
Another, thing that I’m thinking about while I read your post is: Isn’t “wants to achieve financial freedom” a problem that you are presuming that the audience of “affiliate marketer” has? Audience is “affiliate marketer” and “wants to achieve financial independence” is already a diagnosis. One that sounds very likely, but still a diagnosis. Maybe set it aside for now and just focus on safariing “affiliate marketers”?
Maybe it’s interesting to understand why those watering holes have 2-3 year old posts? What happened, where did those people go? Why did they go? What has changed since 2-3 years ago in the affiliate marketing space?
[2023-10-02 05:04:21 AM] : Thank you for this Radan Skorić. I like this part that you said:
"Isn’t “wants to achieve financial freedom” a problem that you are presuming that the audience of “affiliate marketer” has?"
You're correct. The reason i presumed that is, as I said, i came from narrowing down the bigger "Professionals who want to achieve financial freedom" into "Those who selected affiliate marketing as their vehicle to achieve financial freedom".
In that case, do you think i might have had a faulty or insufficient process in narrowing down the broader audience?
[2023-10-02 05:33:15 AM] : I think it’s possible. I’m drawing a parallel to this section from one of the earlier lessons, the one about audience selection: https://courses.30x500.com/courses/26522/lectures/370248 I think this might be a similar case. [File hidden by Slack limit]
[2023-10-02 05:37:12 AM] : Thanks Radan. And yeah that's one of the considerations Im having and probably that's why im also struggling with this audience. Im having a hard time separating my diagnosis.
[2023-10-02 10:00:14 AM] : One good quality of an audience is that they can and do actually pay for things. I forget if the lessons say this explicitly, but it’s kinda implied in the “choose a professional audience” (not hobbyists, students, etc) and there was that negative example of salon owners who don’t tend to buy software. FIRE people in particular are especially frugal :joy: (i was in that audience when I took 30x500). I don’t know much about affiliate marketers from that perspective though.
[2023-10-02 10:04:08 AM] : but there i’d be wondering, are they FIRE first, and affiliate marketers only to achieve FIRE? or affiliate marketers who like the idea of owning their time? I think the ordering might matter there.
still though, i agree about separating the diagnosis. “people who want X” or “professionals who want X” don’t necessarily fit the audience criteria since they mix pain with audience
[2023-10-02 10:27:01 AM] : Thanks dceddia. from the watering holes i read a lot of posts and comments that they're into affiliate marketing because they want to leave their 9-5pm and the magic word for a lot of them is financial freedom. Probably i am a bit biased (because i myself am after financial freedom).
[2023-10-02 10:30:36 AM] : mm maybe you have a bit of pain blinders on :smile: if you’ve got a decent chunk of notes it might be interesting to do some review and see what other pains leap out
[2023-10-02 10:33:02 AM] : but also interesting would be if they talk much about specific affiliate marketing stuff, or if they mainly talk about wanting freedom
[2023-10-02 08:51:32 PM] : You're right. those blinders probably are my problem. but a deeper problem is how to shake it off. And really, the issue i have with "audience selection" (and really once i overcome it i know that ill shoot far like a warp-zone travelling spacecraft) is separating the audience from the problems. What i mean is this, conventionally, let's say I am a health advocate ruby on rails developer (I'm indeed a health concerned ruby on rails developer). And i choose Rails developers as my audience. But then i am interested only in finding out their health (physical, emotional, mental) pains and concerns. Because at the end of the day the ebombs I'll make have more impact if the topics center on their pains, worldviews and recommendations/buys related to health.
But how to do this if all Rails developer watering holes are only filled up with rails developer related concerns (i.e, security, gems, pipeline issues, debates over DHH's views, etc). The same goes for every other audience. So at a high level view. It seems to me that selecting an audience automatically already selects a certain type of problem altogether since the watering holes themselves already only possess a small subset of problems for that audience.
Another example is what Amy used in the course - DIY painters. The problems are already incorporated right away in the name of the audience - the problem of how to DIY pain your cabinets, etc.
[2023-10-02 08:56:47 PM] : hmm, it sounds like the audiences you’ve mentioned are both at the intersection of 2 audiences. (affiliate marketers + FIRE), (health-concerned folks + rails developers). I think each one of those could be considered its own audience (as in, 4 separate audiences), at least from the standpoint of being able to find them online and do some safari.
[2023-10-02 09:18:03 PM] : Oh no, the rails + health-concerned folks are just an example to make my point.
But ok you partially addressed something. So let's take that rails + health concerned folks. So they should be separate audiences? So, let's say i select health concerned professionals (so they won't be frugal or anything) is it already narrow enough?
[2023-10-02 09:20:09 PM] : or let's take the case of FIRE folks (though i've gone thru the subreddits and definitely im not really a part of it as most of them talk about pensions, saving up, etc which i don't put much importance on), do i narrow them down to those who wanna reach FIRE thru investments (i.e FIRE folks interested in the stockmarket) vs those who want to reach FIRE thru their IRA's/401K's? In that case, do i safari the FIRE subreddit watering hole only for those sub-audiences?
[2023-10-02 09:59:57 PM] : yeah, i would say rails and health concerned folks would be separate audiences. That’s not to say a single person couldn’t be part of both. People are multifaceted, but for the purpose of finding watering holes to safari and participate in, writing/blogging/youtubing about a set of topics, and ultimately selling a product of some sort… each of those things tends to focus on just one of a person’s facets.
[2023-10-02 10:01:52 PM] : it might’ve been in a lesson or maybe Alex has just mentioned it here in slack, but the idea of the “cocktail party test” is a good one. How someone would describe themselves at a party, or answer the question of “what do you do?” can help filter down to an audience, or a few. Maybe they’d say “I’m a Rails dev and I also spend a ton of time at the gym and I’m into homeopathic medicine” - I’d consider that 3 separate audiences, in that you could find watering holes for all 3, but there’s probably some overlap between them too.
[2023-10-02 10:06:48 PM] : on safari, and especially early on, it’s good to cast a very wide net for pain, just looking for everything they love/hate/complain about/struggle with/etc
[2023-10-02 10:11:07 PM] : Thank you dceddia! I think somehow you provided me with the light (i said "somehow" because i need to act upon what you said and act on it with full resolve).
[2023-10-02 10:11:09 PM] : for the FIRE audience, i would think of the FIRE folks broadly as “the audience”, and then there are pockets within it that have different worldviews and pains. Big umbrella topics might be investing, saving, whether to get there faster with side income, different ways to make income on the side. Some of those topics could cause them to hang out in multiple forums, so you can follow those leads and expand your safari. In the FIRE subreddit you’d see a lot of FIRE-specific worldviews and stuff, but at Bogleheads you’d see a lot of the same people but different discussions, and in affiliate marketing places you’d see some of the same people but a different facet of them (and also a bunch of people who wouldn’t be caught dead in those other watering holes, but that’s fine, it’s all data to collect)
[2023-10-02 10:13:07 PM] : so you don’t have to decide from the start which pains you’ll help them with, just figure out what pains they have and start making ebombs
[2023-10-02 10:57:51 PM] : Treasure-filled! Thank you dceddia. Yes, going back to my original post, i really feel that in spite of the quantity of safai i've done, my skills are still insufficient as i haven't done what you said like "follow those leads" to other forums (based on what they said in the initial forum).
[2023-10-02 11:02:06 PM] : safari gets easier with practice! after a little bit (sounds like you’ve done enough to benefit from this) it can be interesting to open up some random watering hole about something you know a little about but aren’t professional and haven’t researched extensively, and do some safari there. I’ve tried this a couple times and it’s really interesting how pains/jargon/worldviews are easier to spot when they’re a little less familiar.
[2023-10-02 11:05:56 PM] : Yeah that's another thing altogether - worldviews haha.. I'm still roughing up some edges as far as my "painstorming" is concerned so i am looking forward to getting good at identifying worldviews
[2023-10-03 12:20:06 AM] : Another thing about audience selection is that it works best when you have experience solving problems that audience has. Forgive me if I misunderstood, but it sounds like you want to teach affiliate marketers how to achieve financial freedom while you're still working towards it yourself.
You don't necessarily have to wait until you reach financial freedom. Maybe you've been making $5k/month consistently for the past year, and if you have a repeatable process that you think can work for others (see Survivorship Bias), you could narrow down your audience to those who want to earn their first few dollars with affiliate marketing.
As Dave mentioned, expand your Safari net, and when you review the pains, see how many of them you can realistically address based on your experience. You could also have experience solving one specific pain, and if that pain keeps surfacing over and over, then you might have something there.
[2023-10-03 01:01:13 AM] : Hi monfresh. oh how i wish i was already at $5K a month in business haha. That'll be a great day.
I guess my issue with affiliate marketers as well, as I mentioned in my OP is that it seems generally they only have one problem - "how do i start?". So i can break down that question into several elements and even after addressing those elements i might be able to run out of ebomb ideas.
In short, im seeing there's only a number of problems to go around. How do you suggest i go beyond what i see in the watering holes?
[2023-10-04 03:49:32 PM] : Ryan you've got lots of good notes from fellow students in here, in addition to the ones I've given you before.
[2023-10-04 03:56:05 PM] : the main one here is that you're doing a lot of (totally normal!) thrashing around the decision, instead of actually trying the thing even if the outcome is imperfect.
[2023-10-04 03:56:57 PM] : the big red flag I'm seeing is you choosing non-professional audiences, or trying to get fancy and inventing audience intersections.
[2023-10-04 03:57:25 PM] : I remember from our email convo that you were concerned about finding problems "nobody has solved before"
[2023-10-04 04:00:58 PM] : IMO, both of these concerns all point back to the same thing, which is that you're trying to help an audience you aren't sure if you can help or not.
which there's only really one way to find out the answer to. :wink: any idea what that is?
My #1 advice for everyone is that as long as you're following the fundamental rules:
• professional audience
• that you belong to (or have advantages in)
then almost every other question can only be answered by trying to help them, and ebombs/audience participation based on Safari are two of the most reliable ways to help them.
[2023-10-04 09:58:07 PM] : Im gonna make a wild guess here alex haha - hmm maybe i should know if im really a part of this audience?
[2023-10-04 09:59:53 PM] : I'll ask a different way: How would you know?
[2023-10-04 10:00:44 PM] : Hint: it's not a feeling.
[2023-10-04 10:01:09 PM] : From the safari notes - all the pains i see in there and then i can select which ones i know for sure i can help them with..
[2023-10-04 10:06:35 PM] : you're waiting to "be sure" you can help them before you do. What's the problem that's causing you?
[2023-10-04 10:07:34 PM] : And what could you change or add to your process?
[2023-10-04 10:14:07 PM] : ok embarrassing as it is but after careful thought, i think my problem is im already planning ahead in my mind the solution... logically i know that is the anti-thesis of 30x500 but my subconscious mind is fighting me on it. Also, i might not really be that passionate enough for this audience and i just selected them because i feel that those solutions i have in my mind are something they always buy. alex that's i guess my main problem. The "financial freedom" thing is also in my mind as i select the audience (problem, need first then im selecting which audience i think have that problem, not the other way around).
[2023-10-04 10:16:43 PM] : No need to be embarrassed, you're here to learn
[2023-10-04 10:19:22 PM] : That said, now you're giving reasons instead of solutions, and right now you need solutions.
I'm going to bed now but i am leaving you with a question: what comes next in 30x500 after finding pains, and how could that help you "be sure"?
[2023-10-04 10:22:35 PM] : Thanks Alex. Ok you go rest :slightly_smiling_face: But to answer your question, based on the first ebomb exercise i should list 2 questions i see in the painstorming/safari notes then only answer ONE specific question/pain (crispiness).
And there's still another that's blocking me from fully moving forward -- prior to 30x500 i already have an existing Medium blog and Substack newsletter where I already have followers and subscribers (not too many, around 12 substack subscribers). I guess my mind says "Oh you want to stick to the topic in. your Substack or you need to start all over".. For transparency here's my substack - https://visionarysolopreneur.substack.com and my Meduim - https://medium.com/@ryvee. I have established a theme already for them and maybe my fear of having to shift my topics is also creeping into my brain every time i do the exercises.
You don't need to respond to this but just wanna put out also that one of the main reasons I think im struggling is i suck at finding watering holes.. I think i can stick with my original audience but i just need to get better at watering holes search.. For instance, im not sure how to treat a blog article as a watering hole.. do i only look for articles/blogs that have lots of comments? Or better yet, how do i use an article to chain me into other watering holes? In short I wanna get damn really good at watering hole search and painstorming, worldview storming, jargon storming and buy-recommend-storming.. Wanna be the Sherlock Holmes of Sales Safari.
Good night alex. You can answer this whenever you're back up online :slightly_smiling_face: Thank you again
[2023-10-05 12:13:15 PM] : I'm gonna give you some tough love Ryan: you're really good at giving reasons why something won't work or you shouldn't try :wink:
It's great that you want to be excellent at Safari and finding watering holes, but you don't HAVE to be excellent at it in order to start taking action.
My tough love advice is that from what I can tell, you're using perfectionism around audience selection, finding the perfect watering hole, even your previous blog as a way to prevent yourself from doing the one thing that ties all of the 30x500 steps together: using the skills, knowledge, and experiences you already have to help people who want to be helped.
[2023-10-05 12:13:55 PM] : the things you're doing aren't working, so doing more of them or letting them stop you from doing something isn't going to create the results you want, right?
[2023-10-05 12:14:53 PM] : If I were in your shoes, I'd stop trying to pick the perfect audience, forget the past blog (even if those 12 subscribers were an advantage, it's clearly holding you back more than it's helping). I'd stop worrying about being an expert at the specific steps of 30x500, and instead using the steps to achieve the goal they're designed to help you do, which is find people who need help and help them.
[2023-10-05 12:15:21 PM] : I'd stop worrying about future problems, and solve the ones that were right in front of me.
[2023-10-05 12:17:43 PM] : I really hope this lands as intended, and you can take it to heart! the only way forward is by taking actions that help people, and not worrying about if they're the "best" or "most optimized" - worst case scenario is that you get some practice in what it feels like to help people with those skills, and some true confidence in your own abilities that you can only get from trying.
[2023-10-05 07:50:30 PM] : Hi alex. Oh i need that tough love so I am fully accepting and embracing it! :slightly_smiling_face: I sooo appreciate it. I really needed to hear what you just said. It's what's stopping me and for sure I should overcome. Ok with that I will start this all over - I'll go over again with audience selection. This time really really follow what you and Amy said we should do (without even a hint of pondering about if im selecting it right based on my own criteria).
Yes, my mind is so good at justifying things. Sometimes it does me good. But it's pretty evident in this case it's harming my progress (and success).
Thank you thank you Alex:slightly_smiling_face:
[2023-10-06 12:02:12 PM] : glad this was helpful :smile: