by: Willie Crawford
You don't have to be in business online long before you hear or read hundreds of times that joint ventures are the secret to big success. The fact is, that joint venturing with those who are already in contact with your target market is a big shortcut to profitability. However, you have one big problem...
The next time that you're sitting in traffic at a busy intersection, spot one pedestrian in the crowd. Observe this person for a few seconds. Now, consider that this person is probably totally unaware of you. This person has his own life, his own concerns, his own focus. There's a good chance that you'll never get to know anything about this person or ever even see them again. The odds are that this person is totally unaware of you and never will become aware of you.
Online, you are that pedestrian walking through a busy intersection. Most of the people that are your potential joint venture partners are totally unaware of you and will always be that way. On top of that, making them acutely aware of you can be a monumental task. The reason that this is so, is that many of your potential joint venture partners have literally hundreds of people clamoring for their attention. Their day is like that busy intersection!
I'm going to let you in on a secret though that most people seem to be unaware of. 'The secret joint venture secret' as I call it. This secret is so obvious that most people simply ignore it. What is this secret? The secret is that it's easiest to get the attention of potential joint venture partners in face to face encounters.
There's a reason that top Internet marketers attend large seminars even when they are not speaking. It's where they get to sit around and discuss ideas with like-minded individuals. It's where they get to look potential partners in the eyes and get all of the details on a potential project.
Many top marketers go to large seminars looking for joint ventures. They go to seminars set up specifically for facilitating joint ventures. They attend events like Michael Penland's Internet Marketing and Joint Venture Marketing Super Conference (December 3 - 5, 2004, in Orlando, Florida). They attend events like Jason Cox's Joint Venture Seminar (February 18 - 20, 2005, in Las Vegas, Nevada).
Take a second now to check out Michael's seminar at: http://www.profitautomation.com/app/adtrack.asp?AdID107710 You'll see that it's the ideal environment to set up joint ventures not only with the speakers, but also with the hundreds of people in the audience. At these events practically every person that you meet will ask your name and what you do. They'll also ask if you have a business card.
Asking someone what they do is a natural way to 'break the ice.' When you meet a stranger for the first time, it's a slightly uneasy moment as you size that person up. The polite conversation that's expected is also your invitation to quickly pitch your joint venture project - sometimes :-)
Here's another secret...
Some of the big name marketers use 'gatekeepers' to help control the flow of joint venture offers to them. If they spent all day reading joint venture proposals they would never get anything else done. If they got involved in even 10% of the joint ventures offered to them their efforts would be too scattered and their productivity would be drastically reduced.
One of the gate that you should be aware of is Jason Cox. Take a look at a teleseminar series Jason has put together involving dozens of the world's top marketers at: http://www.profitautomation.com/app/adtrack.asp?AdID107711
What I, and the others marketers have done is use Jason to help control the flow to us. It's the only way we can get any work done.
Another gatekeeper is Ken McArthur's and Sid Hale's JV Alert at: http://www.profitautomation.com/app/adtrack.asp?AdID107712
JV Alert is a community of people who are all looking for quality joint ventures. Members get to post their offers to a searchable database where partners can find just the right joint venture.
Members of JV Alert also get to broadcast their JV offers to the membership. The gatekeeping function that Sid Hale provides is that he reviews each JV offer for quality before it's broadcast to the membership. If the offer is of really poor quality, Sid offers his insights to the novice joint venturer so that he can make the offer more attractive... more likely to be something that the membership would be interested in.
Let's get back to the live events for a moment though, and look at another reason why they are so powerful. The fact is that friends like doing deals with their friends. It's natural to prefer doing business with someone that you actually know and like. At events like Michael's Super Conference, you really have a person's undivided attention while sitting next to them at the dinner table, in the hotel lobby, or around the pool. This is where you really get to explain your ideas in-depth, and possibly even get a dozen different 'experts' point out potential problems that you've overlooked.
So now you know the secret JV secret. You now actually know several proven ways to get past all the clutter and get your ideas seriously considered by those JV partners that you need. Actually, everyone else reading this article knows the same secret. So it's not such a secret any more. However, that's not something you need to worry about because 95% of those who read this won't act upon it!