In issue 43 of Working Hours Magazine, I mentioned Patricia Jones, a 'work from home' entrepreneur from the past. Trish used to publish a magazine in the UK for a number of years which included some 'in yer face' advice and comments. They were nothing short of fantastic for entertainment, for putting the record straight and for becoming a downright 'Must read' for all those invovled in working from home in the UK.
It was a shock to learn that Trish was closing the publication down.
Well, she's back. But not as I originally thought. Trish has written an article, which I've published below. It does put the record straight, puts me in my place and, well, I'll let you decide for yourself.
Patricia Jones is one to watch, take a look at her websites and watch them skyrocket her to success, once again. You've been warned!Martyn And His Rumours! by Patricia JonesAfter Martyn mentioned me last month I thought that I’d better put things straight. No I’m not back in biz ops but I am back on the Internet exploring different ideas.
Credits Ta RaFor those who have never heard of me I ran a mail order business for 5 years and built up quite a little empire. I take credit for a fun adsheet called Dump That Ad and a guide called Simple Ideas Sell. A small home made magazine called the Busy Bee Advertiser, a leaflet, booklet and cassette cover design service, print and mail service and the beginnings of a web design service, a full time job, 2 evenings a week working in a pub but no partridge in a pear tree. It was no wonder that Andrew Watton (a magazine editor) called me a busy bee, causing my sense of humour to convert it into a title.
Modest AdviceIt’s nearly 5 years since I dropped out of biz ops and when I look back I realise that I built up an astonishing presence in the biz op arena from nothing. I was totally broke, my wages were dropping and I feared that I would lose my house. They used to say that only 10% made it in biz ops, I guess that I was lucky.
For those of you who don’t know me I’ll tell you how I did it. For those who remember me don’t get bored, skip to the end.
As luck would have it my first contacts in biz ops were mostly good ones. I was eager to learn, listened, thought about everything and came up with ideas myself. Perhaps all of that gained me help and respect from those who were the big names around at the time. Good contacts are important, but also I tried to help others whenever I could.
I also stayed completely ethical. Honesty didn’t always get me sales but money isn’t that important to me.
I soon realised that the best way forward for me was not mailing out envelopes – I couldn’t afford the stamps. I placed low cost ads everywhere, which was more cost effective. I then felt that becoming a prime source and service provider would do 2 things for me – make money and more important if you are in it for the long term you need to get your name known.
Becoming a Prime SourceAfter 3 months I had the idea for Dump That Ad. I didn’t have a computer but I got round it with a contact that offered to design and update it for me. His designs were excellent but it wasn’t long before I found out that he was a nutter. He wrote extremely nasty, insulting letters to all of the magazine editors who had given Dump That Ad excellent reviews. He was dumped quickly and as I had copy write I took up the generous offer of another contact called Paddy to design the adsheet.
I got a computer a few months later and after learning fairly quickly was able to take over the design myself and offer a design service. Eventually the leaflet design service got my work and contact details into a very high percentage of biz op mailings. The outcome being more orders and when you think about it my satisfied customers were happily advertising my business for me.
Simple Ideas Do SellA year after entering biz ops I wrote and self published Simple Ideas Sell. It got brilliant reviews and did quite well but I made a mistake with it. In my haste to publish I didn’t know enough to package and promote it properly. If I could go back I would have delayed publishing and asked the advice of those who were more experienced than myself. The best advice comes freely from those who aren’t trying to take your money off you at the same time.
Free Publicity and AdvertisingAfter publishing SIS five magazine editors asked me to write regular articles for them. I chose to write for Money Master. It was the best biz op magazine at the time, had the widest circulation and offered me full page advertising in exchange. It also had a brilliant editor called Shirley Garlick. She taught me a lot in our regular conversations, it’s just a pity that we never got that girly night out that we threatened.
If you do come up with your own idea it will have a better chance if you let magazine editors and those who are in a position to give you free publicity see what you are doing.
The Busy Bee BuzzedMy next baby was the Busy Bee. It started out as a single then double-sided A4 advertiser. I got 1000 print and mailed and advertised it in the magazines. It got response and paid for itself but I became embarrassed when people responded to my ads asking for a copy of a magazine. I solved that problem by adding some more pages of ads, folding it in half and stapling it.
I was then able to offer full-page A5 ads and as more money came in it grew into a tidy little magazine that always paid its way. I always got response for my advertisers because I was careful in who I targeted. I added subscriptions for advertising packages and used the money to pay for article space. I had regular article writers, wrote reviews, fun pieces, useful info and I think what Martyn really liked – the scam warnings. ‘Watch Out They’re Out To Get You’ the section was called. I was bad; I had some pretty acerbic goes at scams and scamsters.
The Millionaire NastyThe articles came before they were planned. One of my subscribers was a retired millionaire businessman who was playing around in biz ops. I met him and we got on well until another of my subscribers sent me a copy of a new and expensive money game to see what I thought. I warned my subscriber that it was illegal and she dropped out. The next day I got a call from my millionaire ‘friend’. It turned out that he was part of the prime source and I had lost him money. He threatened to sue me and close me down if I wrote about him in the Busy Bee. He must have forgotten that I didn’t do articles there. For a day or two I was very shaken by his threats but then I thought ‘why should I be frightened of telling the truth and why shouldn’t I warn others not to lose money on something that was illegal’. The articles and scam warnings were born. He never sued me and a few weeks later I was delighted to read an hilarious article about this scamster in one of the Sunday papers.
I exposed many scams and scamsters but I always had positive proof of what I was saying before I wrote a word. I had many a threat but they couldn’t touch me.
Winding DownAs this is getting too long I’ll miss out my Internet ventures except to say that I became fascinated with web design and promotion, which took up an awful lot of time.
I’m sure that you can all see that I had far too much on. I realised that I didn’t have much of a life and tried to run the business without working outside but I needed more company than my own. I dropped some of the more time consuming things and instead of copying, collating and stapling the magazine myself I paid a local printing company to do it. They were a week late and the printing was terrible beyond words. The little magazine that I took hours of painstaking effort to design and put together with little or no errors was brutalised. I didn’t pay the company and after that wouldn’t trust anybody else to print and not spoil something that I took pride in. I carried on for a few more months but I had no real life and didn’t have the heart to continue. I felt that I had nothing left in me, refunded all of my customers and sent them all a letter to say that I was closing down.
Even though things ended this way I learnt a lot in biz ops and discovered that I could do more than I ever thought. They call it a journey on TV nowadays but I call it blooming hard work. Despite that if you have the ideas and patience you can do it all too.
I would like to apologise to any of my previous customers who are reading this. I feel as if I let you all down and I know that many of you were also friends who I walked away from. I would love to hear how you are all doing but please don’t send me your promotions.
My Life SinceI continued writing and posted reviews on Ciao for a while. My nickname is Shewhosmiles if you want to check them out. I work in a local Co-op and love my job. I’ve been promoted once and am happy with what I’m doing. I have gained 2 lovely grandchildren called Harrison and Isabella and adore spending time with them. I’ve been to America – wouldn’t have gone that far with the business. Rode a horse in California and picnicked up a mountain by Big Bear lake. Spent £1 on the slots in Las Vegas and got chatted up by a very tall baseball coach. I get out and meet people and have more fun. I have a life now and am happier than before.
Even so I got bored a couple of months back and started to search for something more on the Internet. I’m relearning web design and by the time you read this I should have 3 sites up and running. Hopefully I’ll learn my lesson from the past and not take too much on.
As Martyn seemed to be hinting about an article I thought I’d give him one. Bet he didn’t bargain on all this!!
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