Lou began to touch on this with his post in Izzo's thread, and rather than hijack that interesting thread I thought I would take his quote and branch off in in a new direction, as I realize this is a topic just simmering across the internet among fitness hobbiests and pros.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lou Schuler
It definitely matters to me who created the program.
Sometimes it's for professional reasons. Most of my workouts come from books I'm writing, or from trainers I'm considering as coauthors. If I come across a workout by Joe Schmo, I won't do it unless I see something so compelling I think it might have potential as part of a book.
As for marketing, I'm immune -- total nonresponder. My friends on this forum complain from time to time about marketing pitches they find too aggressive or deceptive, but I barely notice that stuff. I expect marketing to be aggressive and deceptive, which is why I tune it out.
As a consumer, I won't buy anything unless I have good reason to believe it's been vetted by people like me. If it's a book, I want the author to go through some filters so I don't have to decide on my own whether or not this person is serious.
The main filter is the publishing industry itself -- having an agent, getting published by a mainstream company.
But, since anyone who's famous can get a contract to write a fitness book, I want to know that people like me have achieved success with this program. I want reasons to believe the author's advice will be useful and effective.
That means the "who" is absolutely a deciding factor. If it's not someone with a good reputation and track record, I'm not going to invest my time and energy in his or her program.
Here's what I would like to do in this thread. I would like to open Pandora's Box and openly discuss this toxic topic. Here's the catch. I'm opening it in here as a "containment chamber," which means that I DON'T want this bleeding out into other forums, and I want any participants who wish to take part to follow some very basic groundrules:
You may not go off in an emotional tirade against any professionals. Keep it logical.
We will mention people and their methods by names. Realize that I am probably going to go out and invite people mentioned in here (or that I anticipate will be mentioned) to participate in this discussion, so keep it civil, and speak in here as if you were standing in a room, face to face with everyone else.
If I (or my mods who will be watching this discussion closely) think you are starting to become non-productive, I will simply delete it. If I don't have time to send you a PM explaining why, refer back to this sentence and understand what the goal of this thread is.
All this being said, let's crack this topic open, and talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly!
I will start with a few thoughts of my own, and expound on them throughout the thread, especially once we get more people jumping in.
To get this topic going I'm going to give a little history on myself, this forum, and my observations of recent events.
I have been a trainer for 20 years now. I'm not certified in 10 different modalities, and I'm a college drop-out, but I have managed to have a pretty successful training career. I started getting involved with the internet back in 1995, and launched this forum back in 2002.
Since then I have watched fitness marketing take on many shapes and forms. Some I have used, some I have kept at a distance. I have been heavily influenced by experts that I have discovered on the Net. Probably my first big influence was Paul Chek, and for a time, I did everything on a stability ball. After having my ass handed to me a few times, I dug deeper and changed my methods.
Probably the biggest influence on the way I train today was Bill Hartman, who just showed up in here one day, and then proceeded to blow my mind. It wasn't necessarily everything he taught, but he influenced the direction of my reading and self-education. He changed my questions, and those led me to change my entire approach. It reinvigorated a really burned out trainer, and a new world opened up for me.
Despite how much I loved his method of communication (his writing is excellent, as is his live presentation), I didn't really care too much for his web site, which was a looong letter with tons of changing fonts and font-sizes, with a "but wait, there's more" ginsu knife marketing feel to it. And his wasn't the only one... I started seeing more and more of them.
That's when I heard of this guy, Ryan Lee. At first I was pretty skeptical of this guy, Ryan, but many of my friends in the industry whom I admired greatly sung his praises, so I decided to suspend judgment. And regardless of how some people scoff, it obviously works.
At that point, this forum was drawing a pretty large number of pros from many other sites. I was pretty stoked about it because these were people whose stuff I had been reading that were coming here and openly discussing their ideas with our community.
I went to Ryan's bootcamp last year and was blown away. Ryan has more charisma in his fingernail clippings than most trainers I had met combined! I could certainly begin to understand why he was so successful. Even to this day, I have resisted using his marketing style, which has now been labelled (internet-wide) "the Ryan Lee Method," but I did adapt parts of what he talked about, and I didn't begrudge anyone from using his method, as people tend to do better when they stick to a system of some sort.
I came back with a few more contacts and pumped up to the gills with excitement. Strangely, this community didn't seem to share in my excitement. I started loading up affiliates and promoting other people's stuff, and observed some backlash coming from people in here... this community with a reputation for being friendly!
Nearly a year later, things started to explode, as if a pressure cooker had been secretly building up. Symbolic had pissed off Alwyn one too many times, and Alwyn's posting slowed way down. A couple of people got into a pissing match with Dos, and his posting stopped. Another poster questioned the integrity of Mike Robertson (unfairly I think), and he quit coming around. Then Gobbla wrote a negative review about one of Eric Cressey's products (one I happened to really like, incidentally), and Eric quit posting.
That was also the final straw for one pro, who demanded that I remove the thread. Although I disagreed with Gobbla's recommendation, I didn't think that he made any personal attacks against Eric, and felt that to delete his post would have been censorship, so I let it stay, and watched a small pack of pros march out of here forever. That seemed to have been the detonation point of a fuse that was lit over a year ago, and people not even involved in this community reacted strongly.
The damage was much more than that though. There seemed to be an internet-wide environment of hostility towards the fitness pros, spanning from BB.com, to T-nation.
I thought I was the only place in turmoil, but I found that there was bickering all over the place. Some old guy (can't remember his name at the moment, but he's one of the original functional training guys) really came down on Ryan, claiming that he ruined the industry or something like that, and started a war of words between those two (something you would NEVER think you would see from a friendly guy like Ryan, but was probably justified if what I heard was true). A place called bodyrecomp had created a "haters" forum, where they regularly slam "gurus" and their marketing methods. TC was throwing in the towel, ready to dump his forums altogether. Chaos had broken out!
Something was becoming painfully clear though... The fitness industry is changing, and it really needs to get everyones attention, most especially the pros. Consumers have become much more sophisticated and educated, and marketing methods had not yet caught on.
I had many illuminating discussions with Lou Schuler and my other mods, and I feel like this is the proper outlet to finally bring this ugly topic out in the open and fully examine it.
The goal here is both to engage honest self-examination, and to discover a method for us fitness pros to promote our products without sacrificing our integrity. I see a lot of extremely talented pros in this industry fall into the trap of using available methods in a half-assed manner, which probably unfairly points to Ryan. I also see some half-assed trainers use those methods extremely effectively, and they don't have the the content to back it up.
What other marketing methods are there?
What methods have you tried, successfully or not?
What are some methods that have worked on you?
What is good about Ryan's method?
What is not good about it?
How would you change it?
How can we heal this rift that has occured between fitness pros and fitness consumers?
That last question is the most important to me. Yes, as a fitness pro like anyone else from any other industry, I want to be successful. But success isn't just financial. My intentions in creating this forum and dedicating myself to the fitness field are altruistic, and I want to get back to the point where there is an open exchange of information. What steps do you think need to take place for this process to occur?
**Footnote: I realize in reading this over that I mention Ryan a lot and it is not my intention to make this thread all about him. He has certainly made his mark on this industry though, so he may have gotten a little more ink than others.
I'll expand on this later when I'm hopefully less drunk, but I'll start my viewpoint off with this:
People are easily deceived. When it comes to fitness/diet/exercise, the "average person" has his/her wellbeing largely placed in the hands of others.
When these others choose to violate that trust, willfully or otherwise, I feel a certain duty to light on fire the asses of those that would lie or otherwise deceive.
Why? Because I've been there and done that, and I don't enjoy being lied to or having my expectations falsely inflated.
So yes with JP's recommendations in mind later on I will name names and go into greater detail, but at the moment I'm far too intoxicated.
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I'm okay with just watching, but I'm curious about the intent of the sub-forum and it's topics. The name of the sub-forum implies that's it's for trainers to have discussions, but John specifically invited non-trainers to discuss things in the first thread.
How can we heal this rift that has occured between fitness pros and fitness consumers?
Honestly JP, I don't know if you ever will heal the rift - especially since when it involves internet marketing. But I think there's another issue that lies beneath the surface, in that I don't think a lot of people consciously realize how posting on a board opens them up to being permanently scruitinized.
While we do a lot of joking around on this forum, overall we keep it on target in regard to fitness. You keep a pretty clean board and there's nothing terribly offensive here. I'm also on Oxygen. It tends to be a little fluffier than this board but I still learn from folks over there - I wouldn't be where I'm at right now without either of these boards. However, at O2 I had the misfortune of being one of several people that members of Lyle McDonald's board targeted to make fun of. I found out about it and was pretty shocked to see fitness pros and other people whom up until that point I had respected taking part in the being made fun of.
I will always wonder if the questions I ask are being taken back to other boards and being made fun of. It won't stop me from asking the questions, but nonetheless the question still lingers.
You also said
Quote:
The goal here is both to engage honest self-examination, and to discover a method for us fitness pros to promote our products without sacrificing our integrity
I think (and this is coming from a position as a technical writer/web designer and who does business communication for living) what many fitness pros don't realize is whatever you link to/promote on your site and allow to happen on your forums reflects directly back to your integrity or lack thereof. I know Lyle is well respected and writes good articles, but because of my percieved lack of integrity on his part for allowing that kind of stuff to occur on his board, I won't spend my money with him.
I think your question list in your second post is dead on and there's several things I am willing to contribute from a communications perspective if it's okay with you?
__________________ It all starts with the mind, but the thoughts, the intention aren't enough. Action needs to come next. Dream it, believe it, plan it, execute it, celebrate it. - Wendy
I'm not a trainer, but in my industry, law, we are going through this whole advertising thing, so:
1. Fitness pros are trying to earn a living like everyone else. Why should anyone begrudge professionals being paid for their services?
2. The pros product is knowledge. When they bestow this for free, that's nice.
You can't expect them to give all their knowledge away for free though. See #1.
3. In order to sell their wares, which are forms of knowledge, pros need to tell us about their goods. They need to advertise.
4. You can object to the form of an advertisement without flaming the advertiser.
5. Bad ads do not a bad pro make.
6. If you have some knowledge of fitness, these ads are not generally directed to you. Don't be offended. If they are, try to separate the knowledge from the bull.
I do not really like the ginsu ads. They must work though or you would not see so many of them. When I see those ads from someone I like or who interests me, I speed read all the boilerplate and look for things that would indicate whether I would like the product.
That said, if you write an article or book, not everyone is going to like it or agree with it. Some opinions will be informed, some will be ignorant. You have to expect that and can learn from both. Does the opinion raise an error in your program or something that did not occur to you? If the opinion is ignorant, is it because of a lack of clarity in your communication? I argued for a living for twenty years and had people telling me I was wrong or worse both orally and in writing. A lot of times I learned important lessons from those people. Sometimes it changed my opinion. Sometimes it changed my method of expression. If I did not feel the opinion was in any way beneficial, I ignored it and moved on.
In my experience, pros build good will for themselves by making themselves available. People buy their products and go to their seminars. They don't just hurt us by going away, they hurt themselves. For example, there are products I would probably buy, if the creators were available for questions regarding the suitability of their products for someone with my abilities.
it wouldn't hurt to develop two different paths for the ads - I guess one of those long, irritating, lots of yellow highlighter and building of a false sense of urgency ("act now before the price goes up") for the sales that will come that way - and another one for normal people who get actively turned off by the hype but would respond to something more plain but professional. IMO. Also - If I sign up for a "newsletter" and it is 99% hype for more ways to get my money - I feel disrespected by that person and will not buy a product again.
The classic annoying ad for me is for Berardi's precision nutrition. How many years has it been buy this month and get for only $99 after that it goes back to $150 or whatever it says. A true early bird special ad doesn't bother me, eg Craig Ballantyne with his specials each month, because the price actually goes up. Not sure if Berardi's thing comes under the false advertising legal stuff (but that might only be in australia), but that kind of rubbish is what makes me think less of the product.
I'd like to say that i'm immune to advertising but that wouldn't be fully true. Ads that let me know of a product i didn't know about are fare enough and I'll choose whether I want to product or not. Eg Chad Waterbury's ebook that came out a few days ago. The product seemed like it would suit where I am at this stage and having previous products from Chad knew it would be of high standard.
T-nation ads are completely lost on me. I skip section of articles regarding biotest products. I don't think less of trainers who have a heap of biotest ads in their articles as they are being paid by that company as well as some editoral licencing going on. The thing that suprised me for a second was that some of this product pushing even carried over into muscle revolution, but at that time the book was only available off t-nation and with shipments each month of products to the authors homes then these products quickly become the only ones they use therefore think are the best. Purhaps being from Australia means that I'm more hesitant to buy into the whole t-nation supplement thing, not sure.
Ebook over hard copy is another thing I use as a guide. I like hard copy so I have something physically on my shelf but sometimes ebook are the preferred option as the postage and exchange rate really kills any bargain that may have been going. Ie Muscle revolution goes for $40US and cost me about $90australian to get to my door. Chads ebook was $20 and only cost me $22.
Think i've rambled long enough. Great forum though.
Biotest probably gets ragged on more than any trainers out there, but that doesn't stop the constant flow of posting over there. So why are people so hard on them?
So if I owned a supplement company, what would be the best way to market it? You could go the traditional route and get placed in GNC, but if you want to really make your mark it doesn't hurt to get a bunch of respected pros to write articles that promote your products.
In print ads, they call editorials that you buy "advertorials." The reason they are successful is that people naturally don't trust an ad, but if an article speaks highly of your product and it appears to be pure editorial content, then it looks more objective. The problem is that after readers "figure it out" they might become resentful.
How would you recommend they strike that balance? I didn't exactly see anyone turning their noses up at the Spike Shooters or the Metabolic Drive bars that they got in their goodie bags (compliments of TC). I honestly haven't tried all their products, but the few that I have I really liked (shooters, met drive bars [yum], that post workout powder [can't recall the name at the moment], and their protien powder). I don't sell Biotest products from this site, so is it necessary for supplement companies to sit around and wait for non-paid endorsements?
If we were a focus group trying to help people like TC, Ryan, and others [me], what could we tell them as far as the kind of advertising that really works on you without insulting your intelligence or invoking resentment? You absolutely HAVE to market yourself if you are going to be successful in your field. I have honestly been shocked at some of the resentment I have faced when I made a few meager attempts to actually make some money off this forum. If you are a fitness consumer reading this, can you explain where this resentment comes from?
Paula, I haven't read those posts about you, but honestly, you can't let those people get to you. You have the right attitude... Just shrug it off and keep doing what you're doing. Sometimes I think people lack the maturity to fully appreciate how permanent posts in an internet forums are. It's worse than a tatoo! That kind of behavior will come back to bite them in the ass, I guarantee you.
I was both shocked and dismayed to see people out there slamming pros. It can put some people in a really awkward position if they personally know the parties being insulted. I recognize that there is some anti-guru backlash right now, which is important to pay attention to. I just hate to see people do something that may hurt themselves more than the person they are taking down. People who want to be respected as adults or professionals should act like both in my humble opinion.
The only problem I have with the biotest ads is the shear volume of them. Same thing really with any ad. Take "junk mail" in your letter box, if there is one ad in with my mail then it makes it inside the house and might get read before being chucked out. However if there is a big bunch of junk mail then it all gets thrown out at once regardless of what it's advertising. See what I mean?
I know some things in these posts are somewhat rhetorical questions but I want to hit at them as if literal from a professional point of view.
What is good about Ryan's method?
First I don't think it's Ryan's method. Anyone who researches some history in marketing finds out almost instantly that this is A method and for the most part THE method. Ryan I think did the best at finding a way of making a certain kind of online method fit in fitness the best. It also has a lot to do with networking, talent, etc. In general this type of in your face bold advertising has been the standard and it always will be. Take a look at this poster for joining the navy during WWII http://www.rare-posters.com/3320.html
What do you see here?
Exciting exclamation mark header!
Urgent need to response for fear of bad occurring.
A powerful image of achievement.
The feeling of wanting to know more.
Don't you want to know more? I mean damn this war is over and I am fired up!
This isn't the Ryan Lee method, this is THE method. It may change in image a little as sure there are other ways, but this is what brings a response in you. Be it negative or positive it insights feeling and THAT is the point, getting to the heart, the fear, the happiness, and the PAIN of the consumer.
What other marketing methods are there?
There isn't one marketing method that doesn't try and reach the consumer on a personal level. There are only different roads to take, the final stop is all the same.
What methods have you tried, successfully or not?
I like to keep things honest and exciting. I don't play a lot of games. If time runs out it does. For example in my Hell program. I didn't just x out the offer for ongoing support, it really got filled. However, do I leave it there so people know that it did, damn right! If I offer something again in the future they might jump on it more quick now, or they can think I am full of crap, but those people wouldn't buy from me anyway so what do I lose out on? Nothing.
What are some methods that have worked on you?
Just being me, being honest, being helpful, and understanding that I don't know it all, but I can offer all I do know.
What is not good about it?
There is good and bad in all of it. People that want to take advantage. Just bad people, who left a bad taste.
How would you change it?
You can't change the method, you can only change your nobility in the use of that method. Having character and intrgrity and being a stand up person is what sets you apart. Take a look at Cosgrove. You NEVER see him get attack. He has sales pages, he is on testimonials, he has high priced programming (notice I didn't say overly priced please). Why does he in general escape all this drama and criticism? Because he has the goods to back it up, he has nobility, it shines through, his character sets him up to where you go "yeah I may hate that style of marketing but you better believe I am getting my hands on that product."
How can we heal this rift that has occurred between fitness pros and fitness consumers?
What I find so funny is we aren't all attacking The Biggest Loser or Celebrity Fit Clubs "smash diet". Is it because it is so far out of our league and we have no choice but to create out own level of Hollywood? Or is it a different issue all together, is it just merely that some have a bad attitude, got to cocky, and ruined it for others? Could it be it isn't marketing at all but just people have crappy personalities, are in the fitness public spotlight and you are being called out?
The only thing that I see that needs to change is the separating between thinking someone is a "douch" but seeing there is talent and at very least a lot of hard work that has occur and some nobility in THAT work weather or not you think they suck as a person.
I think for the most part most of us can do that and only sometimes does it hinder use of a product depending on just HOW much that person sucks.
Ok now that I'm just really hungover instead of really drunk, I'll expand a little bit on what I said.
I think possibly it's just my outlook on things, but as I've stated over and over I'm very much a reductionist when it comes to training and nutritional ideas. Boil things down to the simple rules, and really there's not a lot of variation.
Yes we can go on and on with endless wanking about perfecting X quality or Y exercise or whatever, but to me this is useless nitpicking and will not translate into real-world results.
Which is fine, I'm all for useless theory-wanking, if it's kept in context. Labcoating can be fun as long as you don't lose sight of the big picture because of it.
Sadly, many people do. I see it here on this board pretty much daily, where people assume that X program is fundamentally different from Y program, and those are different from Z and so on.
Assuming these programs are decently designed, or non-retarded as we like to say, then guess what? They'll all get the job done. And variety is a great thing in exercise.
The problem is not that. The problem is the priority on which this is given. The micromanagement of programming variables will not tend to yield your results.
I've heard the argument made more than once that fitness professionals can do the things that you the "average person" can't/won't etc, and there is validity to this as well.
However it may surprise people here that my only higher education is a BS degree in an entirely unrelated field (criminology to be precise), and up until this spring when I broke down and took the CSCS, I had no certifications or industry related affiliations at all.
So now we've already found that most people have the wrong priorities, emphasize the micro over the macro, and have a mentality that the subject matter is staggering and complex to the point where they could never learn it.
This is prime time for exploitation, and the entire industry has devoted itself to tapping in to that niche. This is where I have my problems with it.
On the one hand yes it is understandable; I love the field. I have contact with a good bit of the guys I've criticized in the past, and the rest know where to find me. I've made it very clear to them that it's not them as people I dislike, nor that I disrespect their knowledge.
I started working out around 10 years ago, right at the end of my time in high school, and I was the typical 18 year old gym-rat know nothing. At a staggering 125 lbs, my only goal was to get bigger so I could score the babes. Most of my workouts came from Flex magazine and that sort of thing.
I progressed, a little, but to this day I thank the fact that I stumbled on Deepsquatter's Strength Online page and was introduced to Louie Simmons, Dave Tate, Ed Coan, and all the information over there. For free. This was way back in the day, before T-Mag, back when MFW was still the place to be online, etc.
This was a simple concept: lift heavy, work hard, eat right. No magic, no sales of magical pills and potions, no secrets from the Russians or whatever else. Basic concepts of hard work and consistency. That still shapes how I think today.
Unfortunately, that doesn't sell. What does sell? Exploiting the insecurities and holes in the knowledge base that most people have.
People that tell the truth and don't BS have two options:
1) Write the basics and be done
2) Keep coming up with novel combinations that you can market as "unique programs". At least this isn't really hurting anyone, even though it continually feeds into the myth that you need all these allegedly "unique" programs in order to make gains.
And of course most fitness professionals we see getting targeted today have opted for the third option:
3) Keep re-inventing and re-cycling old topics, or just going batshit crazy (see Poliquin, Chek) in order to stay "fresh and revolutionary"
There's some residual resentment on my part for most of this, as I know what it's like to start out clueless and have to sift through tons of BS in order to get a handful of diamond. In my mind, the guru paradigm has made it that much harder.
It was bad enough starting in the late 90s when you were only being fed supplement-hustling. These days, newbies are bombarded with all the training non-sense as well, being told they "must" spend just $99 in the next 10 minutes for mass-gaining secrets they've never heard of.
Look at that kid shamguy or whatever that was posting here in training recently. Assuming he's not a troll, that kid's been all kinds of messed up by the marketing.
For any of you reading this that haven't achieved your goals but still feel the need to shell out $$$ for the latest and greatest, have you stopped to think that maybe it's not because you lack the super-secret program, but perhaps it's because there's another common element missing?
Dave Tate and Jim Wendler are big on this mindset as well; the idea that the biggest and strongest guys in the world don't sit around discussing sets, reps, %s, and the "perfect program". There's virtually no commonality in what the best and the strongest do, other than the intangibles that the gurus won't (cant') sell you.
You can put people on the right track, but again, that doesn't sell. What sells is feeding into people's desire for the newest and greatest.
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Honestly JP, I don't know if you ever will heal the rift - especially since when it involves internet marketing. But I think there's another issue that lies beneath the surface, in that I don't think a lot of people consciously realize how posting on a board opens them up to being permanently scruitinized.
While we do a lot of joking around on this forum, overall we keep it on target in regard to fitness. You keep a pretty clean board and there's nothing terribly offensive here. I'm also on Oxygen. It tends to be a little fluffier than this board but I still learn from folks over there - I wouldn't be where I'm at right now without either of these boards. However, at O2 I had the misfortune of being one of several people that members of Lyle McDonald's board targeted to make fun of. I found out about it and was pretty shocked to see fitness pros and other people whom up until that point I had respected taking part in the being made fun of.
I'll chime in a bit on this one, since I'm fairly active in all that mess as well.
It's not so much that we don't realize it, it's more that we just don't really care.
This board has a completely different mindset than we do over on BR. We don't see the "fitness professional" concept, nor the internet in general, as being something to take overly seriously.
I've met Lyle in person and consider him to be a friend; from that I can tell you that he honestly doesn't care what you think about him, or if you buy what he's written. He's confident in the material, it's proven itself, and from there if you use the style-over-substance argument (ie, "I like the material but not who wrote it") with him, he's just as likely to tell you to take a hike.
May not be the greatest stance to take on business, but hey you gotta admire him for sticking to the guns.
And honestly, people with that mindset are a minority anyway; most people won't care and will buy his stuff anyway.
From that mentality, pissing off a few people that are overly sensitive is not a huge loss.
Quote:
I will always wonder if the questions I ask are being taken back to other boards and being made fun of. It won't stop me from asking the questions, but nonetheless the question still lingers.
And then you have to ask yourself, how seriously do you want to take the internet?
When it comes down to it, there will ALWAYS be assholes online. You're essentially taking whatever you choose to post and opening it up for the scrutiny of the *combined sum of Mankind in a mostly anonymous setting*. That's not a pretty thing to realize, and if you don't have a thick skin about it you will be very easily offended. Islands like this board are few and far between in that very large and very nasty ocean.
I'd rather deal with a group of assholes like BR, who are 1) doing it on purpose because it's entertaining, 2) smarter on average than most other such communities, 3) really quite reasonable in general, most of the alleged BS is a form of self-moderating, and 4) ultimately have your best interests in mind.
Regarding point 4, this may be a surprise, but that's largely *why* the asshole component exists. We wouldn't be there going on and on about the good and the bad if we weren't trying to help people sort through the crap and get where they want or need to be.
It may suck to get called a dumb shit and be dressed down as can occasionally happen, but I have a mindset where I'd rather be called a fucking dickhead to my face by somebody that means it than be told I'm nice by a person that will badmouth me as soon as I'm gone. It keeps things honest.
Some people don't like that, obviously.
Quote:
I think (and this is coming from a position as a technical writer/web designer and who does business communication for living) what many fitness pros don't realize is whatever you link to/promote on your site and allow to happen on your forums reflects directly back to your integrity or lack thereof. I know Lyle is well respected and writes good articles, but because of my percieved lack of integrity on his part for allowing that kind of stuff to occur on his board, I won't spend my money with him.
And to reiterate what I said before, he really doesn't care. If you choose not to obtain the information he puts out, then that's your loss, not his.
As for the rest of us...well, I may or may not have things to sell at a later date. If I do, then I plan to have effectively the same mindset. I'll stand by the quality of anything I put out, and it's your loss if you don't want it cause you think I'm a dickhead.
Also, I'm not nearly so abrasive in person. I tend to say the same kind of things, but the difference between being in person and the lack of nuances in the online medium make all the difference in the world. So from that vantage point I don't care.
In my mind, if somebody is that put off by my persona, and the fact I say what I think, then we won't get along to begin with and I'd just assume they not associate with me anyway.
Again, not necessarily a smart business outlook, but at least I can sleep at night and not feel like an asshole.
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-JP, endorsing how awesome I am
If you are a fitness consumer reading this, can you explain where this resentment comes from?
Breach of trust.
If I buy something from you it means that I believed what you told me about that product. When I see these ads, "fastest", "secret", "free", "now" or whatever other key words my BS alarm detector starts going nuts. I'm like the drunk dude. I hate being lied to. I mean come on - do I look that stupid? I take things too personally maybe.
In terms of say promoting or endorsing, again, the same thing, especially in a place like this, a social forum, a community, where you participate. You become an insider. You are perceived as a trusted, respected friend. If you try to make money off of me that's fine in my mind, but just do it with a quality product - I mean after all I respect your expertise and trust your judgment. Don't be my friend and then screw me. That's how I view it - being f*d over. BTW I'm not talking about you specifically or this forum or anything promoted here. I don't even look at the ads here. I'm just speaking in general terms.
I was once part of an online community for two years. Mod in the forums. A friend (or so I thought) of the site owner. He sold me something (his own product not health/fitness related) that turned out to be a big fat lie. I never expected that from him. I trusted him. My perception was that he was an honest person. Being a mod and active supportive member of the community I was helping him sell lies!!!!!!!!! BAD. I then had to question my own judgment. I felt stupid because I fell for it - I was part of his stupid scam. He made me not like me. Yeah, I resent him for that.
The ginsu ads, any ad, creates an image in the mind of the consumer. A perception. It creates an expectation. What happens when the product doesn't meet expectations?
I think you really have to identify and understand your target. What are they looking for? What do they want? What do they expect? Are they looking for a magic pill? Is there a magic pill for losing weight? Building muscle? The ginsu ads make it seem that way. At least in my mind. Some of us aren't looking for the magic pill. Some of us know there isn't one. Or at least there isn't one for the genes we've been "blessed" with.
I see the ginsu ads and I hit the back button. I also start questioning everything that comes out of that person's mouth even when they aren't trying to sell me something. I lose respect for them. If a product needs a ginsu ad it must not be worth the money they want for it. A quality product doesn't need a ginsu ad. You ever see a Mercedes being sold with a ginsu ad? For me personally, ginsu ad = cheap crap. In my experience, you get what you pay for.
You'd know better but I'd think in terms of this forum your traffic will (generally) be people who have done or are doing research. They've educated themselves a bit. They aren't really looking for magic pill BS - not if they hang around for any length of time. So, it would seem to me, if you are endorsing something that may be a quality product but is using the low quality ginsu methods, it may not sit well with some. Like Paula said, it will reflect back on you - especially due to the fact that you are part of the community.
That all said, after checking around for reviews from real people (not affiliates) and seeing how seemingly everyone with a web site is an affiliate, I bought Venuto's e-book despite the stupid ginsu ad. The ad triggered all my BS alarms that's for sure. I just read it again. I don't know why I bought his stupid book!!
In the book, forums, newsletter etc, he tells me what IN MY EXPERIENCE I know to be true (key here I think) after being at this for 1.5 years - and that is it ain't easy, I need to work my ass off, and the industry lies lies lies. I suppose I was his target? His product meets my expectations. I didn't expect to be lied to. His program is clearly not the magic pill I wasn't looking for. There isn't even anything new to me in his program but I don't care!
Wow. I guess I must have my head in the sand or something ... I admit that I don't like the ginsu knives type of marketing and the hurry now or the price goes up stuff (although it does work and has spurred me to buy something NOW rather than waiting), but I had no idea that there was such hostility toward guys like Eric, Mike, Alwyn, Dos etc. here on this forum.
I had wondered where they disappeared to since they were pretty active here a year or so ago, but I chalked it up to them being busy. It is too bad that a relatively small few ruined it for the rest of us who truly enjoyed learning from their experiences. I found each of them to be approachable and helpful and willing to answer PMs or emails. When I met Alwyn in Boston last February, I introduced myself as "UConnJulie from JPs"!
JP, I also don't understand why there has been hostility toward you for the affiliate links ... I mean, what do people think? That this board doesn't cost you money to run? It's only fair if it is to be a free board (ie no membership charges) that you should be allowed to make some money off of us to defray the cost. If I'm going to buy a superband, why shouldn't you get the benefit of that? I'm sure it's a ridiculously small amount of income that doesn't even come close to defraying the expense of running this forum. So I personally am happy for you to get some benefit from my spending habits!!
I think what happened for me with the marketing stuff was that I felt bombarded by all of it at once ... I think it was after that Berardi Christmas thing last year ... I ended up on 4 million email lists and would get about a million emails each week telling me to act now or the price would double. Then when you checked back a month later, the price was the same (except for Craig, I've never seen anyone increase their prices), so you felt lied to or betrayed.
As for Paula's experience, I am just shocked. I understand Matt's explanation, but I don't think it's right. On the internet, on the telephone, in line at the grocery store, with my clients, with my family, with my friends, I aim to be the best person I can be ... and that means that I purposely go out of my way to be nice. If someone is irritating me, I kill them with kindness. I cannot imagine going out of my way to say things that would be hurtful if they were said to me. And I agree with Paula that it certainly lessens my esteem of such persons who voluntarily choose to be blunt to the point of making fun of someone. I certainly don't think that people should have their butts sugarcoated or whatever, but I also think that it is possible to get your point across without being nasty. I have been to Lyle's forum, but I have never posted because it seems that the people who frequent there go out of their way to be purposefully nasty, and I don't want to associate with such persons. Lyle is a smart guy and does have good solid info to share, but I sincerely believe in what comes around goes around.
My thoughts are all running around disjointed ... I guess I need to sit and think about it a bit more ... I would like to heal that rift, but I'm not sure how. Have the ones who left ever given any indication about what it would take to get them back?
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The issue for me is that the 'Ryan Lee Approach' is very easily adopted. The style of marketing has been around for years - Ryan has done a very good job at exploiting this particular cash cow. We all know that the central idea is to appeal to the weaknesses of the target audience and create a sense of urgency etc.
For me, the strategy has become too abundant; it is very difficult to differentiate the wheat from the chaff just from the ad page. In the past you had career professionals adopting the style and the products did what they claimed, however the rate at which these pages are appearing has 'greyed' picture. Pretty much anybody can buy these ad templates/services and hey presto their in business.
I don't have stats or figures but I’m fairly confident that a large amount of the sales come from people who are 'too busy' to do their homework about the author etc, the page does exactly what it is intended to do - bring you in and goes for the sale right there and then (a key sales strategy - never let your customer leave to think about it later).
My opinion is that if people are fooled it's their own problem for not researching. You wouldn't buy a car without looking at reviews, performance etc, why let somebody loose on your body before establishing they know what they claim is correct.
Yes, much of the bonus' and offers are a load of hyberbole but as in any sales technique - Caveat emptor (buyer beware).
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but I had no idea that there was such hostility toward guys like Eric, Mike, Alwyn, Dos etc. here on this forum
I wouldn't say there was any hostility... All three of those guys are highly respected in here. To this day I see positive comments to all of them.
I almost think it was the other way around... I felt a lot of resentment toward us from the pros, probably in some part because I wouldn't delete a post here or there, so ultimately I guess it's my fault.
Not to say that there aren't many other pros in here who are open to the type of dialogue we favor in here... Lou is still here, Alan Aragon, Izzo, Peele, and so on. I just miss those guys because I consider them friends and I wish they had stuck around.
I don't think Bill is avoiding us... In his case I think he is actually busy. He manages several PT clinics and trains and writes and on and on. Something had to give, so the free advice train finally stopped.
I have been a trainer for 20 years now. I'm not certified in 10 different modalities, and I'm a college drop-out, but I have managed to have a pretty successful training career. I started getting involved with the internet back in 1995, and launched this forum back in 2002.
Since then I have watched fitness marketing take on many shapes and forms. Some I have used, some I have kept at a distance. I have been heavily influenced by experts that I have discovered on the Net. Probably my first big influence was Paul Chek, and for a time, I did everything on a stability ball. After having my ass handed to me a few times, I dug deeper and changed my methods.
Probably the biggest influence on the way I train today was Bill Hartman, who just showed up in here one day, and then proceeded to blow my mind. It wasn't necessarily everything he taught, but he influenced the direction of my reading and self-education.He changed my questions, and those led me to change my entire approach. It reinvigorated a really burned out trainer, and a new world opened up for me.
Nearly a year later, things started to explode, as if a pressure cooker had been secretly building up. Symbolic had pissed off Alwyn one too many times, and Alwyn's posting slowed way down. A couple of people got into a pissing match with Dos, and his posting stopped. Another poster questioned the integrity of Mike Robertson (unfairly I think), and he quit coming around. Then Gobbla wrote a negative review about one of Eric Cressey's products (one I happened to really like, incidentally), and Eric quit posting.
That was also the final straw for one pro, who demanded that I remove the thread. Although I disagreed with Gobbla's recommendation, I didn't think that he made any personal attacks against Eric, and felt that to delete his post would have been censorship, so I let it stay, and watched a small pack of pros march out of here forever. That seemed to have been the detonation point of a fuse that was lit over a year ago, and people not even involved in this community reacted strongly.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Jean-Paul
I almost think it was the other way around... I felt a lot of resentment toward us from the pros, probably in some part because I wouldn't delete a post here or there, so ultimately I guess it's my fault.
Honestly, I don't see this as your fault. You didn't say who handed your ass to you... but you took it and learned from it. That's what I would expect a professional person to do regardless of the industry he or she is in. Take your mistakes and learn from them - figure out what you need to do make yourself/your product better.
I can see Dos's and Alwyn's points of view if someone starts a pissing match... Why should they bother to post if the same person is going to stir stuff up every time they do? If posting goes from advantageous to being a pain in the ass that may cause things to get carried over into their face-to-face business, then why bother with it?
I went back and re-read Gobbla's review. It seems like it's a fair review from a layman's point of view. I think you and Lisa did a great job chiming in from the professional's point of view. I found it odd that Eric himself didn't respond to the review in the thread itself. And there maybe discussions in other places that I am not looking at and should, but I have to wonder if the pros that left when Eric and Dos did were just looking for an excuse.
I don't think anyone likes to have something they create criticized, but if you look at it as an opportunity to make something better the next time you do a project, some good can come from criticism. The only time I've found (at least for myself) that I have a problem with criticism is when my own ego gets in the way.
__________________ It all starts with the mind, but the thoughts, the intention aren't enough. Action needs to come next. Dream it, believe it, plan it, execute it, celebrate it. - Wendy
I wouldn't say there was any hostility... All three of those guys are highly respected in here. To this day I see positive comments to all of them.
I almost think it was the other way around... I felt a lot of resentment toward us from the pros, probably in some part because I wouldn't delete a post here or there, so ultimately I guess it's my fault.
Not to say that there aren't many other pros in here who are open to the type of dialogue we favor in here... Lou is still here, Alan Aragon, Izzo, Peele, and so on. I just miss those guys because I consider them friends and I wish they had stuck around.
I don't think Bill is avoiding us... In his case I think he is actually busy. He manages several PT clinics and trains and writes and on and on. Something had to give, so the free advice train finally stopped.
Exactly right. I've e-known Eric Cressey for awhile, and he's helped me w/ some joint issues in the past for free. I don't have enough good things to say about him in regards to his knowledge of rehab and mobility stuff. Same for Mike Robertson, Alwyn, that whole group of guys. It's never been an issue with me personally disliking them, or thinking they were somehow incompetent or whatnot. When it comes to the knowledge base, for the most part I respect the hell out of that completely.
It's purely a backlash against the clown-college marketing from people that are smart enough to realize the backlash it will create for them. What I've been told by those in the group that I've spoken with is that they hate it just as much, but it's a "necessary evil" type thing. Understandable maybe, but if you want to stand apart from the crowd and you're *that* good, you don't do the same thing that Timmy the 150lb guy that's been lifting for 6 months is doing to market his manuals.
Of course I look around at other guys that I highly respect and see how they do things. Mark Rippetoe is a guy I consider in that category, and he's got two (soon to be three) awesome books out that I'd vouch for in a minute. He's done none of the Ryan Lee marketing. What he did was put out quality products, after actually having established a solid reputation in the field, and word of mouth has carried it since then.
Dan John is another name that comes to mind in that field. Yes he occasionally writes for T-Mag, but he's not generally bandied around the other fitness professionals. Dan John is ridiculously informative, yet doesn't employ the spam model either. There's plenty more of these guys if you look around.
What some of you see as hostility is nothing of the sort. It's calling a spade a spade. I can differentiate between calling someone an idiot and calling what they do idiotic, even if those reading me don't carry that away.
On the other side of the coin, while I'm sure he has a lot of good things to say, Dos is a wanker. Pure and simple. I'll be repeating myself with this one, but he is not god. Yes he's worked in the field a long time, which means he's got some good things to say for sure. But 1) that doesn't put him above any sort of criticism, 2) there's others with just as much or more experience that won't act like wankers and are actually quite humble about their learning, and 3) there's nothing he'll say that I can't get for free from others with more time in the field.
Part of the problem I see with the fan-worship of only a select group of fitness professionals is that you're limiting yourself to a group that, while they may certainly have the experience and knowledge, has chosen to market themselves.
Do you (generic you) realize how many coaches/trainers will ever write for T-Mag or write a book to sell online, compared to how many there are in the US? In the world? It's a very small percentage, and by simply assuming that this core group of fitness pros is all there is, you're short changing yourself. Go ask a given D1 strength coach who Alwyn is or who Eric Cressey is, and odds are the response will be "who?". This is not an indictment against them, so don't take it that way. This is a matter of those of you reading this not having perspective on the field that exists out there.
The simple truth is most strength coaches are too busy doing their jobs to come online and market and make money that way. Personal trainers are a little different story, but the S&C guys are where the real knowledge is.
* A guy I converse with over on Strength Mill runs a D1 program with several hundred athletes in about 15 different programs. He's lucky to get online in a day.
* Buddy Morris at PITT, same idea (though some of yall have known both him and Tom Myslinski via EliteFTS).
* I know a coach over in Ireland working with their Olympic teams, among other things. I see him online maybe 1-2 times a week now because he has something ridiculous like 500 athletes to deal with.
* I think John Sullivan posted over here at one time. Sully's one of the best coaches you may not have ever heard of. Why? He's busy spending his time training people and running a facility, not posting articles online and worrying about all that.
Those guys are wealths of training knowledge and experience, but you don't see them online all the time marketing. Why? Because they're busy actually getting people better. What's even more ironic is that these guys will still go out of their way to help people out. For free. You call them or email them when they have a free minute, and they'll be happy to chat about what they do.
So Dos has 20 years of experience? Fair enough. When he acts like a dick, gets huffy and claims nobody can criticize him, hey that's cool if that's how you want to roll. Just don't post pics of your athletes doing cleans with blatantly horrible form (I'm far from an expert on OLs and those made my knees and shoulders cringe), say you'll put your form against anybody, then throw a tantrum because you got called out.
You're not above reproach, and if you want to be a snot about it, there's others offering just as good or better without the hassle.
Also, the guys that are still here, I can't say enough good things about. You may miss the guys that threw a tantrum and left, but that should make you ask yourself why they were here to begin with if simple reasonable questions and critiques drove them off so easily. I mean hell, even Chad still drops by occasionally to promote things, knowing I'm still here regularly. He scores points just for having the balls :p
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Articles | Blog | Pirate my book. "Yeah, but you did your post grad thesis on trolling, so you don't count."
-JP, endorsing how awesome I am
Generally, I am not impressed by the o-called Ryan Lee model. I use the term "so called" because he did not invent it, but first applied it successfully to the fitness industry and it may not be fair to attribute all the shit that comes out to the Ryan Lee Method. He is not responsible for everyone putting crap out based upon his marketing model.
That being said, I believe that kind of advertising model targets the fitness novice, especially one looking for the ever elusive quick fix. I think the fitness professional need to better identify which group they are targetting and better tailor their message to the particular target audience.
As far as the current state of events, I think that Riverbend and Powerman really hit on some key issues.
For me, the trust is a bit more personal in that when I see guys I "know" and trust backing up or supporting something that is not what it claims to be, I feel a personal sense of betrayal. As i mentioned in another post, I am willing to buy products to support people who come here and contribute. BUt I do have a hard time getting past the endorsements of things that just are not up to snuff in, at best, an attempt to create some kind of synergy.
Powerman mentioned the criticism issue. Now I will not call Dos a wanker because I do not believe he is a wanker. I do not agree with the way he handled the incident but calling him a wanker IMO is neither accurate nor constructive. Now I may be biased in his favour because he bult up a lot of good will on this forum before the incident and to my mind, he would be very welcome if he came back. It is regrettable that this whole issue got out of hand and was blown way out of proportion.
I understand where the fitness pros where coming from in the may have felt that they were always fighting an uphill battle with their expertise having the same weight as that of anyone who posts on the internet. I think that frustration was in part what caused the fallout. For better or worse, that is the internet and how it works, and I think this site is very fair and balanced (disclosure: I am a "supermod" on this site) and does its best to act impartially.
At the same time, I think that they need to recognize that on a fitness forum people are going to critique their product. I do not believe that Gobbla's comments were out of line, and there were certainly civil in tone, reasoned and thoughtful and much milder than you would find in Amazon reviews.
How has this affected the site and the membership? Well I think that it has caused a lot of long term members and potential customers to consider looking other places for product, and I think that it is a loss to the fitness experts who did come here. Of course, the loss of these fitness professionals has been a loss, in experience and information, etc.
One thing I would like to throw out there for consideration to the fitness professionals who are marketing their things. If you look at the behavior of JP and the core membership of this site, I think you will find that we have been very supportive of you in the past. I think that we are not the only ones who "lost" in the blow out.
Where does that put us all? Well, I hope the the fitness professions who left after the "incident" do realize that no one here was out to "get them" and we would like to see them come back. I further hope that they will come back and we can try and get back to where we were before the shit hit the fan.
Peter
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Peter
After all, diamonds are a girl's best friend…
My biggest issue are "fitness professionals" that moved away from distributing information and dialogging to selling products. They no longer share the same space as a forum member or "fitness professional" that is strait up trying to help people they're infomercials. They're selling goods and their entire involvement is centered around that so EXPECT to be treated like a door to do salesman. Last I seen of Mike he came right out and said that he was about making money, he deserved it and would do what it took to earn it so anyone that doesn't like it can suck it. That's cool...you're a salesman. Barardi got his ration of shit for coming only when he had something to sell, that's cool...you're a salesman. Chad popped up for the first time in a long time...with something to sell.
I don't think the community shifted so much as the pro's. They employed a marketing strategy which purposely ignored any attempt of criticism, said only good things about each other, sent out the exact same letter endorsing other peoples products, and said only bad things about anyone that disagreed....all at the same time....they were obvious about it. They treated us like cows and destroyed any credibility that they built. They lost sight that if they want to be treated like training professionals then first and foremost they need to "be" training professionals, it's OK to sell things...but being a salesman first gets salesman first treatment. Tack on the products themselves not being particularly good, not justifying the cost vs. other resources and not only are they primarily salesmen but they aren't even selling good products. Poo on that. Most of these things aren't any better than any number of books that you can get from amazon for 1/10 of the cost regardless of what the salesman says.
That out of the way, the people I look up to in the field and would be willing to buy from are the people that come every day and try to help people. They develop products that they think are genuinely good, they accept and encourage criticism and I genuinely believe consider us to be people first and cows second.
I like Izzo. He's always been stand up for what he believes in and has good products for good prices.
-Peele brings me joy. You always know where she stands. She's a super person who doesn't accept defeat as even an option.
-Aragon is a stud. He's got enough reasoning for everyone.
-L. McDonald\Cosgrove\Hartman all walk the integrity line dipping from one side to another at times but are all pretty freaking genius. If you're THAT good then you can get away with a little shady here and there.
I was going to stay away from this thread but I felt that having a web presence, I should contribute. I have had disagreements with Ryan Lee personally, and HE can attest to it. We've had some discussions in e-mails regarding his marketing practices in the fitness field and sorry to say, the guy knows me by name for all the wrong reasons. I actually met Ryan back in 2001 when he was very "small time" and he was a very enthusiastic, helpful guy. He was involved in Perform Better's vendor circuit up here in the Northeast (mainly Boston and Jersey). He was promoting the hell out of SportSpecific (which at the time was an AWESOME forum and site). Chaney and I were one of the original members of that forum and we got to exchange ideas with Ryan, Mike Boyle, Coach Alejo, Lee Taft, and Josh Henkin.
Then Ryan created PTU which was a site that dealt with just fitness marketing and "get rich" schemes. I think when he created that site, my opinion of him changed. He began promoting "be a millionaire in 10 days" products and alot of new trainers in the field began to buy into it. Alot of new trainers who just entered the field began to "want to learn how to make money and less passion on how to help people. When I noticed Ryan was making more money off of these guys, I came to the conclusion that he was getting rich off of making others think they can be as rich as him. I called him on it and he defended his stance. I felt that marketers are out to deceive you...to sell you something that is less than concrete and real. The idea of selling people promises versus selling them results, didn't make sense to me. After all, Ryan dabbled in personal training at a children's hospital for 2 years--that wasn't enouh to convince me he was an accomplished fitness professional. So his focus turned into marketing.
It wasn't Ryan...it was the fire storm he was causing...I was noticing these new people entering the field wanting to make $50-100/hour just to move the pin on a weight stack or carry a clipboard. I saw trainers memorizing exercises in photos rather than reading texts...I saw the personal training field explode since 2003 with less than mediocre 'professionals'. It was disgusting...it was a bunch of fake McDonald's springing up around McDonalds...with comploete fake arches (MacDowell's vs. McDonalds). I blamed Ryan Lee....
Then I think he began to see the sh*tstorm he created and backed off a bit. The sad thing is there are still perpetrators out there that practice the same tactics to fool the consumer. That is the job of sales people...to fool you to take out your wallet. The sales page IS A neccessary evil for the internet community. I racked my brain to think of something else to promote Eye of the Trainer...but everyone kept tell ing me that was the way to do it, becuase no one else would bother buying it because they didn't know who I was. Stand alone...it is an awesome product...but no one gives a sh*t because it is not supported by the marketing tactics that are used by the majority (getting friends to cross-promote, newsletters, etc).
Personally, I don't sell my products to become rich and retire...I sell my products to sustain standAPART (pay for bandwidth). The amount of work that goes into mainatining a website (updates, articles, newsletters, etc) is RIDICULOUS! I can count on 2 hands how many times I thought about shutting mine down because of the amount of work (on top of my own work) and the BS I deal with with forums.
Do you know how many assh*les I deal with on other forums that DO NOT understand what I do, but sit in judgemnt behind their keyboards. It is a shame when professionals have to be scrutunized by a benign audience. If I want to be scruitinized, you'd better have a day where you train 8-10 people in a row, develop exercise programs in your sleep, and you'd better get up at 5am to meet your client at 6am. I know consumers have a right to be opinionated, but in the fitness field everyone thinks just because they can plant tomatoes, they are farmers.
My passion for this field stems from outsiders "thinking" they can obtain a certification and write about it...or train their neighbors and expect me to call them a professional...or become famous because they have friends in high places. I believe in hardwork, honesty, and concreteness. And I will "call out" people professional or not becuase I have had my grill runin to teh ground over the internet and my business has suffered from it, but I stay in this field because my bills don't depend on my website and my love for helping others and staying fit outweigh the scrutiny I receive. So, for those professioanls that do bow out in the heat of scrutuinity, I question their intent. Don't show me pics of your best deadlift at 26...show me what ya got now...
The more I read the more my opinion become, if you want to be a businessman you need to study business. This is akin to saying if you want to be a trainer you need more than a certificate. If you read one book or follow one marketing practice don't expect optimal results.
It appears that the on-line industry has landed on the direct mail approach which by most accounts is not the preferred marketing strategy for those that want their works to be seen as premium products. It is this conflict between wanting to be seen as premium and selling like late night TV that screams the wrong strategy and has stirred the on-line firestorm that was mention in an earlier post.
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Past performance is not indicative of future success.
Never argue with an idiot. They drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.
It is this conflict between wanting to be seen as premium and selling like late night TV that screams the wrong strategy and has stirred the on-line firestorm that was mention in an earlier post.
Summed up well.
I forgot to mention that "Lou" is on my short list of studs as well. He's not technically a trainer but again has the integrity and knowledge to point us in the right direction. He's been helpful, polite, and just a cool guy every time I've ever interacted with him.
Adam Campbell makes the list as well. He's probably the only "expert" that I genuinely miss. Super guy.
I'll gladly plop down the $ for these two because of the positive interactions that I've had. If they're putting it out I'll pick up a copy just to do my little part in keeping them in the game.
On a topic related note, I like that Alwyn backed off of the pimp wagon. I know he got a new business helper person and it seems that she really helped him keep his feet above the bullshit that got pretty deep. Touch and go there for a little bit but like Gabe said he seemed to shift back (and shift his recommendations) back to premium, quality materials\co-workers. At least that's the impression that I've been getting.
I will say, that if a mod does decide to delete a post (as in the case of mine) at least have the balls to send a PM. That anonymous shit is very lame.
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"It's a round hole, dammit. Everyone fits."--Anonymous Mod at Strengthmill
I remember a lot of talk when the product sales starting filling up the training discussion, that everyone was in agreement that if you are a good forum member and actually have something to contribute of purpose and helpful then if your product information is in your signiture I'll look into it. Have to say that those few that stayed and have products to sell might not get as much business by providing continual free information but they gain a hell of alot more respect from me and I'm sure others. (Alan, Lou, Peele, John, and anyone else I forgot).
P.S This forum is great John and JP. Great information when I've got a sec to read it all.
Fitness Marketing Methods
I hate being lied to. I mean come on - do I look that stupid? I take things too personally maybe.
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