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Recently I made an embarrassing (and rather expensive) mistake. I don´t regret that because I believe in life, there are no mistakes. Everything is only experience and the lesson. So this time, I accidentally ended up in London.

Fun story:

I like to watch Ali Abdaal’s videos on YouTube. Since he started to write his book Feel Good Productivity (3,5 years ago!) he mentioned that in each of his videos. And for a long time, I was ignoring that. I didn´t need another book about productivity. But 2 months before the book was supposed to get out, after watching one of Ali´s videos, I decided to pre-order the book. He offered a live planning workshop as a bonus and talked about how awesome the LIVE workshop will be so I got inspired. He also mentioned that “hopefully, there will be hundreds of people IN THE ROOM” so obviously, he was talking about an in-person event, right?

I pre-ordered the book and in the next moment, I focused on searching for the flight tickets. He lives in London so OF COURSE, it’s going to be there. No need to listen to the video or read instructions on the book sales page because I already got it. I´m clever enough, am I not? 

A rather expensive mistake

Nope. It turned out it was a live ONLINE event! So there I was, watching an online workshop in London. On my phone because I forgot to take a power cable to my computer 😀 If you have known me for a longer time you know I don’t regret making this mistake. I was having fun and enjoying my time there while trying to put together all the lessons I got from this experience. Actually, there are many of them 😀

Experience is the best teacher

I spent HUNDREDS of dollars on coaches telling me the same thing: if you want to sell something online, you have to repeat the offer over and over, use BIG letters on the key points, and put a bunch of big red buy buttons on your sales page. I didn´t believe them. It felt as if I offended my potential clients. It’s as if I expect them to be idiots. Now I KNOW FOR SURE WHY it works like this 😀 People are not idiots. They are just busy. So here´s the marketing advice I paid for but now I´m giving FOR FREE:

You definitely NEED a whole bunch of big red signs and exciting buttons on your sales page!

Repeat that over and over

Another advice I wasn´t ready to follow. I said that once already, I don´t want to feel being sleazy. I told that three times in the last month so everyone must know that at this point, right? And then I realized that I was listening to Ali Abdaal talking about his book in EVERY video for a few months without any problem. And even more interesting was to observe the process leading to buying his book:

When I heard about the book for the first time (actually, the first few times) I ignored that. Then I started to be curious and pay attention. After a few more videos I started to consider buying it. Then I realized that probably, I don´t need another book about productivity. I ignored that again in the next few videos. And then, in one video where he was super excited about the live event he was offering as a bonus, he finally got me. And here´s the lesson:

  • I needed to hear the offer maybe 20 times before I made the buying decision
  • I didn´t have any problem listening to that over and over
  • It was the bonus that moved the needle and inspired me to buy

Your own experience is the best teacher 😀 Now, I´ll remember to follow that advice in my next campaign 😀