A wise person once said, "There are many trails to the
summit of any mountain." I've also heard it said that "all
roads lead to Las Vegas" and that there is "more than one
way to skin a cat."
While I've never skinned a cat (I love animals) and haven't
been to Las Vegas (don't want to go) I have hiked many
different trails to reach the summit of my favorite
Oklahoma mountain. Each trail I took landed me on the same
spot, at the top of my mountain, where I could enjoy a
breathtaking vista and see a hundred miles or so into the
lush and verdant landscape of neighboring Arkansas.
So, how in the world does all that relate to your own
business success?
Simple - you need to create profit trails that lead back to
you - and you need to create as many different profit
trails as it will take to get you where you want to be.
But unlike the mountain, where any single trail will
eventually land you at the top - chances are that no single
profit trail will ever deliver what you want in terms of
income and lasting business success.
A Case In Point From The Dirt World
Recently I visited a small privately owned pharmacy to get
a refill on a medication. While waiting I made note of the
numerous profit trails the owner had working for him, all
of which lead back to one spot - his cash register.
Besides the usual pills, ointments and elixirs, he also
offered unique gift items and a classy wrapping service,
greeting cards, healthy candies and snacks, gourmet kitchen
items, stuff for horse lovers, a full magazine rack and
best selling novels, and more.
Now, if that pharmacist relied only on a single profit
trail derived from selling pills, chances are he wouldn't
be in business much longer.
Business Is Still Business - Even On The Internet
It seems to me that many people are completely missing this
point. Rather than view their Internet efforts in terms of
a real and lasting business, I think many people equate
Internet success with winning a Lotto. They unknowingly
doom their own chances by jumping from one opportunity to
another, hoping for a single huge payoff from a single
profit trail.
I'm sorry, dear reader. It probably won't happen that way,
no more than a small pharmacy can make good only by rolling
pills.
Don't Put All Your Eggs In One Basket
That seemingly silly old wisdom hits a home run in this
context. When you have multiple profit trails leading back
to you, your income will not only increase, it will
stabilize. You won't suffer when one trail is suddenly
blocked by a landslide.
You might not know that the women and men who are presently
at the top of the Internet marketing ladder have been
working for years to develop their own multiples of profit
trails. Not many, if any of those successful people derives
her or his total income from a single source. That, if
anything, is the big secret that very few are talking about.
Finding Your Own Profit Trails
There is one aspect of the Internet market that is new and
vastly different from anything that has ever been presented
in the history of open market commerce. Opportunities for
the small budget entrepreneur are literally boundless, and
the potential for business growth is no longer limited by
the sky. It reaches into outer space!
Opportunities for you to create multiple profit trails are
literally wide open - limited only by your own degrees of
desire, motivation, and ingenuity. And every action you
take in developing your business should create another
profit trail that leads straight back to you.
Now, rather than bore you with a bunch of theory, let me
show you the real profit trails I have leading back to me
as of this writing:
> Direct sales of products I have developed.
> Direct sales of resale rights products I've bought.
> Promotion of other people's products for affiliate
commissions - meaning dozens of excellent "mini-trails" and
an unlimited potential to create more.
> Monthly residual income from referrals I've made to
various programs, webhosting services, etc. - again, the
potential to create more "mini-trails" is limited only by
my own degrees of desire, motivation, and ingenuity.
> Sales of my own skills as a service for fee - ie. adcopy
writing, webmastering, etc.
Like the pharmacist, I'm not depending on any single profit
trail to provide my total income. And I have more trails in
the works.
If you're not already doing so, I suggest you get busy
right away, and create as many profit trails as it takes to
get you to the top of your own mountain. You're sure to
enjoy the view.
Dan B. Cauthron - the 'anti-guru' - has been involved in
direct marketing for more than 30 years. Join his NEWS
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