It’s 10PM as I finally lean back in the big green chair, prop up my feet, and MAKE time to update this blog. I feel like I need to apologize for not updating in awhile. Perhaps apologize isn’t accurate. I feel more like I should make amends for putting off a commitment I made to myself. This i2o blog is supposed to be something I decided to do in an effort to chronicle the activity of my adventures in capitalism. I’ve been making excuses that I’m so busy with the adventure projects that the blog can wait. That’s cheating myself out of a learning opportunity and really not helping me to slow down and analyze my movement to better understand decisions and the resulting errors or triumphs. So here I am… enough excuses.

So the last time I blogged here at i2o I was mid process of testing for all intents and purposes “project 1″ which has somehow turned into what is lovingly referred to by my mentors as The E-Trade® approach to CD Duplication. I’ve set up a Jason Fried style beta launch of a website carefully driving demographic traffic segregated by means of media outlet marketing. Facebook links go to one version of an index page, twitter to another, Google Ads to a third, and blog commentary links to the fourth. Using Analytics and Urchin reports from Media Temple I derived the best bang for my buck in terms of advertising dollars from the web. I only used two criteria for what I deemed “effective” means of publication. Unique visitors and intent to purchase.

Unique visitors is “A statistic describing a unit of traffic to a Web site, counting each visitor only once in the time frame of the report. This statistic is relevant to site publishers and advertisers as a measure of a site’s true audience size, equivalent to the term ‘Reach’ used in other media.” Thank you Wikipedia.

Intent to purchase is a stat that is somewhat less reliable but equally as important to know. That was determined by requesting the visitor to complete a (in this case literal) call to action in order to request a purchase. For the test I simply placed on the website that the shopping cart was down for maintenance and to please call our customer service number (Google Voice Account) to order.

I did this test for only 3 days to determine an educated guesstimate for click through, bounce, and conversion rates.

Google AdWords was a huge disappointment. The CD duplication space is so crowded bids on key words that were even remotely relevant were $4 to $12 a click! For this project… way to high. Facebook on the other hand was amazingly handy. I was able to target specific demographics with unique audiences for each display of the ad exactly what I wanted to pay. Because the ad was so targeted I was able to get the best conversion of the test at 15%. Which if you don’t know is wicked awesome in terms of marketing on a small scale. Twitter is very new to me and quite honestly I’ve not quite figured out how to talk about a product or service without turning people off or coming across as an ad spammer. There are a lot of “out of the garage” CD/DVD duplicators on Twitter who never tweet anything but the fact that they offer duplication service. I found that extremely annoying when I followed them… so any input here would be greatly appreciated. By far the most fun was the blog commentary. Engaging in actual conversations with real people was very enlightening and I got a plethora of feedback which for the most part was disbelief that I would offer such a unique model. Conversion for Bloggers was 3%. Still much better than a mail campaign and will most likely be something I continue just for the shear fun of talking with folks.

Testing completed and a conservative benchmark in place with an actual black ink budget has pushed me forward to full launch. As of February 8th the new adventure will be in full swing and on the path to becoming a new business for AIC, LLC. owned not operated by yours truly. That’s not a typo by the way and I’ll get to explaining that one in another post.

Here are some great questions I got from people in my research:

Q: Do you really think you can break into a saturated market and make any significant income?
A: Um… Yes or I wouldn’t do it! Here’s why I’m optimistic. While it’s true it is next to impossible to come into any market, let alone a saturated one, and make the slightest dent… that’s not what I’m doing. What I’m doing is creating a new category in that market or “niche-ing down” to an untapped very specific need. Charles Schwab didn’t invent the brokerage house. He didn’t talk about better traders, or faster phone guys, number of floor reps or any of that kind of thing EVERYONE else was talking about. Instead he created a new category. The first discount broker. That’s what I’m doing. For the companies that would love to do on demand CDs but find it cost prohibitive without doing them in house. The bloggers who would like to provide tangible information products without having to order thousands of units to get a good price. The struggling musicians that think downloads are great but understand they are difficult to hand out or sell at their gigs. These folks and many others need a discount broker. Here I am.

Q: If this is so great and such a needed solution, why isn’t anyone else like <removed name> or <did it again> doing it?
A: Great question. My guess? They most likely feel like they are the big dogs and no one can knock them off their porch. Perhaps they are right. Experience is a great teacher and I’m a novice with an idea. Then again, Kodak thought digital cameras were a fad that would never catch on and chose to ignore it until it was very nearly too late.

Q: Won’t the hand holding, mastering, art, proofs, etc. for the short run (I think they were inferring novice) types kill any margin you might have?
A: Yes. Which is exactly why I will not do any of that without an extra charge. Those who provide their own master, art, require no proofs and sign off on an “as is” duplication will get the best price as a reward for not being a pain in the keester. Those who may require any or all of those ad on services will have a fee associated with that hand holding. I’m offering a simple solution to a problem of volume duplication. I’m not offering a baby sitting service… those guys can call <name removed again>.

Q: With those extra charges won’t you run off some potential customers?
A: I hope so. I never get into any business with the intent to loose money. Customers who require too much from you are not only a drain financially but mentally on you and more so on your employees. You’ve heard of many business guru’s who give advice to “fire” certain customers? I find it’s better not to hire them in the first place. This company is designed for a smaller demographic with very specific needs and we will cater to them in every value added way financially feasible. I’m not looking to jump into the big pond with the other little fish running from the large mouth bass.

What about you? Go ahead… rip me apart in the comments below and in the mean time, I’ll keep you posted.