Before you spend that money, let's talk about history
Have you noticed all of the advertisements on the Internet from
"gurus" and people who have "made it" with their Internet
business? You know the ones, they tell you how in demand they
are. They tell you how they get several thousand dollars for
each seminar they give. They tell you how they've made hundreds
of thousands of dollars online. And they tell you they'll give
you their secrets and formulas for the "ridiculously low price
of $99.95"!
These characters are all really slick. Their one page web site
is designed to draw you in, convince you, and take your hard
earned money. Some of them are written really well and the
product is very tempting to buy. But does a little doubt linger
somewhere at the back of your mind? Is there something holding
you back but you just can't quite put your finger on it? There
might be a valid reason for that.
Let's travel through history a bit and see if we can figure out
why you get those tiny doubts....
Orson Wells. Heard of him? War of the Worlds. Heard of that? I
think almost anyone in the U.S. knows both names, but for
amusement I'll summarize the story. The War of the Worlds was a
fiction radio story. I think it was broadcast in the 1940's or
1950's era but I don't remember the exact date. This story
happened to be science fiction, and happened to involve aliens
landing on Earth and starting a war. Now the story was put on in
full production mode -- just like the fiction movies you see on
TV today with professional actors. The only problem is, many
people tuned into the radio show while it was in progress, and
they had no idea it was a fictional story! Panic and chaos
ensued.
Jump to the 1960's era. Did you know there was a book that was
put on to best seller lists, even though the book didn't
actually exist? Yep. A radio DJ cooked up a plot to "fool" some
people. He arranged to have listeners go to bookstores and
request a specific book. The book didn't actually exist, and
this was part of the prank. To his and his listener's surprise:
Their requests for this book stirred up interest across the
world. People were talking about the book everywhere -- reviews
were even written about it! And soon enough it showed up on a
bestseller list. But the book did not even exist. The
non-existent book was called "I' Libertine", and due to the
furor created from the prank, the radio DJ went on to write a
real book by that name later in life.
Now let's jump ahead about 30 years. In the 1990's, some of you
may remember computer communities called a "BBS". BBS stands for
bulletin board system, and back then this was a computer that
you dialed in to. Once connected, you could download files, chat
with other members and play games. The public Internet was not
available back then, so this was as close as you could get. One
BBS was having a difficult time getting itself off the ground.
They had one major competitor, and they couldn't seem to win
customers away from that competitor. So the owners decided to
entice the customers. The customers were almost 100% male back
then, and one thing they were all looking for was a friendly
female. So one of the owners of the new BBS -- a man -- took on
a BBS personality of a female. They set up a charade basically,
with all the trimmings. This man would pretend to be female and
chat with all the guys on the competitor's BBS. During the
chats, "she" would make sure they all understood that she could
be found more often on this other, newer BBS. So, if they wanted
to talk to her more, they would have to go over there. And they
did.
Jump ahead to the later 90's and the Internet is just coming
into play as a business medium. I'm personally aware of several
companies which made themselves appear much larger than they
were. How? Primarily by putting up pictures of their "office"
building on their company website. The pictures they put up
however, weren't actually their offices. They were in an
apartment, or basement in reality. But the pictures showed
gorgeous, upscale office buildings. They made themselves look
much bigger and successful than they actually were.
And today we have thousands of one page websites which tout the
accomplishments of their owners. These websites make many claims
and sometimes those claims are hard to believe.
You see, there really are consultants in this world who make
several thousands of dollars for seminar presentations. But
those consultants usually have a corporate style, polished
website. You can tell as soon as you get there that they've
spared no expense in getting the site professionally done.
You'll find links on the site too -- links to corporate and/or
consultant information, links to additional resources, links to
recent and upcoming seminars. There are links to their books too
of course, and sometimes these links lead to Amazon or the
publisher's site. If the book is electronically published, you
can even buy it right on site. The point is though: there is
detailed information there, not just sales hype. In short, there
is supporting evidence that they are who they say they are.
History shows us that people can be fooled into thinking the
world is coming to an end just from a radio show. History shows
us that people will believe a book is wonderful even when
they've never actually seen it themselves. History has shown us
that what you think you see or hear is not actually what you've
seen or heard.
So, when you land on one of those slick, one page sales hype Web
sites. Before you spend your hard earned money, stop and think a
bit. Is the person behind the site more likely telling the whole
truth -- or skewing it in a way that will make you believe what
they want you to believe?