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Simplified Approach to Affiliate Marketing with Chuck Anderson · The One Small Change Podcast

0:00
Hi, everybody. I am so glad you're back with me for another
0:04
episode of the One Small Change. And,
0:08
you know, one of the things we're looking at is what are the unexpected
0:12
and surprising consequences that you've had in your personal
0:16
life in your business from one small change, that you would
0:19
like to share with other people? And so today, we have one of my favorite
0:23
people, Chuck Anderson. And I have to tell you, I'm also
0:27
a client of Chuck's, and he has been a big
0:30
change in my life. But, his
0:34
wisdom and his story is something that you're gonna really
0:38
learn from and be able to put into action, I think.
0:42
So, Chuck, first of all, hello. I'm so glad you're here to
0:46
share with us. And second, what would you say
0:49
would be that thing, that affected
0:53
your business and your personal life so unexpectedly and
0:57
hopefully in a in a in a great happy way. Mhmm.
1:01
Well, thank you, Yvonne. And then I'm so happy to be here, and
1:05
I know we've been looking forward to this for a while. And, you know, I
1:09
don't know how small of a change it was. I mean,
1:13
it it I mean, it's a matter of perspective. It it could be
1:16
perceived as a big change. But one of the things that I
1:20
did about 2 years ago and I've been in
1:24
business now almost 30 years, so there's been a lot of small changes and
1:27
big changes along the way. But the most recent one was about 2 years
1:31
ago where I was felt like I was
1:35
sort of drowning in the complexity of my
1:39
business. And, I was doing a lot of
1:42
marketing consulting. And as a former director of marketing and chief marketing
1:46
officer, there was all these all these different things I was
1:50
working on. And 2 years ago, I decided that I wasn't going
1:53
to try to, be a marketing consultant for all
1:57
things. I was just gonna specialize in one thing.
2:01
And and so so I did that
2:04
and decided that, really, the
2:08
roots of my journey has been affiliate marketing, so
2:12
I decided to specialize in that.
2:15
And and what I'm gonna say, a sub small change may and maybe this
2:19
is the small change. I had too many webinars, too many events, too
2:23
many things going on, and I decided I'm just gonna have one
2:26
talk. I'm gonna have one webinar, and I'm just gonna do that
2:30
one over and over and over again. And,
2:34
really, when I look at it, that has probably you know,
2:37
the the the the focus has been great, but that decision
2:41
to only do the same workshop every month instead of a new
2:45
workshop every month, that has been an absolute game
2:48
changer for me. So I I know exactly what you're saying,
2:52
and so the, you know, the change has to do with stop doing
2:56
so many things all the time and trying to balance so
3:00
many things and focus and get really good at what
3:03
you're doing. And I think, you know, people may have heard this before, like, find
3:07
your niche, you know, but we're we're talking about more than just that.
3:11
We're talking about just making the whole thing streamlined,
3:15
and I've had that situation. So if you were to if you were to
3:19
say to people, you know, how could you implement this?
3:22
What would you where would you say for them to look or to start? Mhmm.
3:26
Well, I'm no expert in this, but I will
3:30
I will I will tell you what I did. And the first thing I did
3:33
was I made a list of everything that I was doing on a
3:37
regular basis, whether it be weekly or monthly or
3:40
quarterly. Most of them were weekly. I was doing a lot of routine
3:44
things, and I made a list of all of them. And then I went
3:48
back over that list and said, does this really
3:52
contribute to the outcome? I just read a book that
3:56
said, you know, 80% of your results come from 20% of your
4:00
efforts. And I looked at it the other way.
4:03
That means 80% of what I was doing was wasteful
4:07
energy or maybe not all that productive. So I went back over
4:11
that list and said, okay. Well, what's in the the 20%
4:15
that's contributing the 80% of my results and what is not?
4:19
And I eliminated everything ruthlessly.
4:23
Right? It's like, oh, no. That did not contribute to sales or that
4:27
did not contribute to productivity or that did not contribute to the desired
4:30
outcome. It's gone. Either parked or deleted or
4:34
eliminated. And so I intended to come back to some of
4:38
those things later on. I'm like, I'm just gonna stop doing these things for
4:41
now. And it's been over 2 years, and I have not gone back
4:45
to most of them. So in some ways, you're following
4:49
my productivity ahead. It's like, you know, what can you put on
4:53
hold? Right? What can you eliminate? But I think a lot
4:57
of people find that really scary. You know, the idea
5:00
that you would do the same workshop, you know, every
5:04
month or twice a month and, you know, it's like it's gonna get stale
5:08
and people are gonna so what was the
5:11
unexpected, you know, consequence of doing that for you? I mean, what did you
5:15
discover that you didn't expect?
5:18
Yeah. There's there's been a few, but I'd say the most notable
5:23
is that we developed fans.
5:27
And so by doing the same workshop every month,
5:31
I found that there were people who
5:34
would put it on their calendar and plan
5:38
to attend the next one. And if I look at a
5:41
lot of the clients I'm working with right now, the majority of
5:45
them attended that workshop 2 or 3 times before they
5:49
decided to sign up with me. And the
5:52
other side benefit to this is now those
5:56
people want to share this workshop and this
5:59
webinar with other people that they know. And so
6:03
I'm getting a greater number of referrals today than I've
6:07
ever received, and I get messages from a lot of my
6:10
clients going, hey. When's the next workshop? I have someone to invite to it.
6:14
And, and so that has been, a really
6:18
welcome change. It's been super exciting to the point where
6:22
now where we're encouraging others to do the same thing in their
6:25
businesses and with their affiliate programs.
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That really didn't happen before. That when we were writing a
6:33
new workshop every month and and, expressing that
6:36
creativity, it was a lot of fun. It's a lot of work, and but people
6:40
were confused. They didn't you know, it was like, are you doing this? Are you
6:43
doing that? And, you know, everything just by this
6:47
this change, it's brought everything into such crystal
6:51
crystal clear focus. People know who I am. They know what I do.
6:55
They know how I can help them, and they're excited to to
6:58
follow and learn more. So that's probably more
7:02
than what you asked. No. It's actually perfect
7:06
because, you know, I talk about the entrepreneurial journey,
7:10
and there's certain patterns and certain potholes and pitfalls that
7:13
we all go through. And the first challenge that we all
7:17
have is getting in front of enough people.
7:21
And when you're doing something new every day, every week, you're
7:25
hoping that your client is gonna be able to figure out what mood you're in
7:29
and where you're gonna be. So, what you
7:33
said actually addresses that,
7:37
in a wonderful way. So
7:40
for instance, do you find that
7:44
people tend to come to your workshops more than once before they sign
7:48
up, or is is there a pattern?
7:52
Yeah. I think there is a pattern, actually. I would
7:56
and I'm just summarizing here, but I'd say about
7:59
80% of the people who are in my program right now
8:03
attended my workshop at least twice. Some of
8:07
them, three times. And I've even had
8:10
people that have attended every workshop for the last
8:14
several months because, you know, what and whatever
8:17
process they're going through mentally, they're, you know, learning, they're
8:21
absorbing, they're deciding to take
8:25
the the next step. So and
8:29
even though even whether they become clients or not, I've even
8:33
had those people refer other people to the workshop, and
8:36
they've become clients. And
8:40
and so we're developing great affiliates for that as well. And so
8:44
that's what I'm finding by by just focusing on that
8:48
one thing versus a 100 different
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things. People are getting more and more excited about it
8:55
than ever before. And it was interesting because I was creating
8:58
if we look back, I was creating all of these other workshops because
9:02
I wanted people to be excited, because I bought into the whole
9:06
idea and taught it for a long you know, for a couple
9:09
of decades. Content is is king, and you gotta be,
9:13
you know, creating all this content and adding value
9:17
and all of that. And, and so I did that
9:21
for nearly 2 decades. And now
9:25
finding out that, hey. Wait a minute. I could have just built one thing and
9:29
did that one thing over and over and over again,
9:33
to the point where now, when I give that talk or I
9:36
do a podcast interview, there's some of my best
9:40
talks because I because I do the same one over and over again,
9:44
it gets better and better and better each time, and I'm developing mastery
9:48
over that one talk. So, you know, this whole idea of
9:51
creating content and being creative and adding value,
9:55
I think, can be our own worst enemy if not
9:59
channeled correctly. Well, I know. The first time I
10:03
heard this idea, I was like, what do you mean?
10:07
You know, this is gonna be boring for me, and it's gonna be boring for
10:09
the people that, you know, I'm serving because they're gonna hear the same talk over
10:13
and over again. Can you talk about that a little bit?
10:16
Yeah. And I went through that exact mental
10:20
process. I'm like, yeah. I I don't know. I don't know if this is
10:24
gonna work. But now looking back, hindsight being 2020,
10:28
it was one of the best decisions I ever made. People are more
10:31
excited about it now than than they were
10:35
before. I think before, it's like, okay. Well, what is he gonna do this month?
10:38
Do is it a topic I want? Is it a topic I don't
10:42
want? Or what is it? And I think we we inadvertently created
10:46
confusion in the minds of our because we were always doing
10:49
something new. And, you know, one of the the signs
10:53
of success, I believe, is consistency. And I I
10:57
know when I'm looking for a mentor, or a source
11:00
of information, I look for consistency. It's one of the things that I
11:04
value the most. It's like, are you doing the same thing today
11:08
as you were, you know, 2, 3 years ago, or is
11:12
it a new flavor every month? And and
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I'm realizing now more and more, and I wish I had realized it
11:19
2 decades ago, but that consistency doing that same thing
11:23
over and over again, it develops mastery, but I think it also
11:26
develops confidence and excitement in your
11:30
audience. So the opposite is true. We worry that we're not creating
11:34
enough value for our audience. We're not creating enough content for our
11:38
audience. But they, you know, they
11:41
wanna be able to consume and absorb this and understand it when we're
11:45
always giving them something new. I think we're we're we're creating a
11:49
constant state of confusion or uncertainty.
11:53
And so so there has been unexpected byproducts for
11:57
the of this. And I would say that fear of
12:00
by narrowing down to just one thing, am I
12:04
limiting myself? Because here's what happens, and I hear this all the time, and
12:08
I was in this, state as well. It's like, well, I don't wanna
12:12
I don't wanna exclude anyone. I need clients,
12:15
and, yes, I can do social media, and, yes, I can do paid advertising,
12:19
and, yes, I can do, affiliate marketing and
12:23
strategy, and I and and and probably a 100 other things that I
12:27
could mention. And and so I don't wanna say
12:30
no to a potential client. Like, if someone came to me and said, oh, I
12:34
need help with this. Sure. Oh, I need help with this. Sure.
12:38
And so I didn't wanna say no. And that was that that's the comment
12:41
that I receive a lot when I talk to people about niching
12:45
down and and focusing on one thing is that they don't wanna
12:49
exclude. They feel like that, you know, things are already
12:53
scarce, and they're only gonna get scarcer. When the opposite is
12:56
true, what you're doing is you're creating that clarity and consistency,
13:01
and that opens the pathway for more
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people to come to you. Well, you know, you said that. And
13:08
one of the things that came to mind for me was if you do
13:12
the same thing over and over again, you start to create you you start
13:16
to find your niche because pea those people will be attracted to
13:19
you. It's as if you had a store, you know,
13:23
and you kept moving the location. Like, today is Thursday. I think I'll go a
13:27
couple blocks away. I'll go someplace else. Where if you keep your store in
13:30
the same place, people will come to you that want
13:34
what you have. And so, you know, you're not you
13:38
know, you're getting better and better what you're doing. And I think the other thing
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is that I think what we don't
13:45
factor in that is even though the information may be basically
13:49
the same, because you may have a different mix of
13:53
people coming to the workshop. You've got some people who are repeating.
13:57
You've got some people who are, you know, are who are clients. You've got some
14:00
people who are new. That mix keeps changing, and so
14:04
the the vibe in the the Zoom room is different.
14:08
Do you know? I mean, I have you know, for when I do this, it
14:12
depends on what's on my mind at that time. I mean, I still have the
14:15
the talking points that I go through, but my examples can be different,
14:19
do you know, of what I'm doing? And and the other thing I
14:23
think, and you can speak to this, is as
14:26
entrepreneurs, we tend to not
14:31
evaluate and measure our results. We just jump from
14:35
one thing to the next. Can you talk about that a little bit? Oh,
14:38
yeah. For sure. And I think this is, a
14:43
a result of a very common I don't
14:47
know. Mindset's not the right word, but belief that, you know,
14:51
do do what you love and and the money
14:54
will come and, you know, and just follow your heart.
14:58
And I I do follow my heart. I think that's important.
15:02
But I at the same time, I think we have to, you know,
15:06
do ourselves a favor and and follow that direction. And I
15:09
think oftentimes, and I won't speak for other people, but I know
15:13
there were times where I got confused by, you
15:16
know, what my right path was and
15:20
what my you know, the little voice that that that speaks to you
15:24
in fear and says, no. You should be doing this instead. That'll never work.
15:27
And and so we we we end
15:31
up going off on a lot of
15:34
different directions. And, I don't know if that answered the question or
15:38
not, but that was what came to me when you asked the question. It it
15:42
does. But I think also if you're only doing one thing, it's a lot
15:45
easier to track the results. Oh, it's very easy to track the results
15:49
because so now it's okay. So now it's
15:53
not what is our new idea for a webinar. It's when
15:57
is the next date and time. And we can compare. We can we
16:00
know how many registrations we've had. We know how, our
16:04
our what our show up rate is for that webinar. And
16:08
there was a time where we we would look at that and go, oh, okay.
16:10
Well, we we we don't like our show up rate. Let's do something about
16:14
that. And with having those measures, we were able to implement some
16:18
other strategies and go from a dismal, you
16:22
know, like, 12% to well over 30%
16:26
show up rate. And, our conversion rate in the
16:29
beginning, was, I mean, maybe 5%.
16:34
And, again, by keeping track of that, we
16:37
were able to say, well, jeez. How how could we do better? And I think
16:41
that's what it it causes us to ask better questions of ourselves. How can we
16:45
do better? And so it started off at 5%. Now it's
16:49
closer to 30. And I think, you know, the way we attribute that
16:52
to a few things. Number 1, we would never know that if we didn't keep
16:56
track. So we need to measure along the way, how am
17:00
I doing, and then how can I do
17:03
better? And when you ask yourself that question of
17:07
how can I do better, then notice the ideas
17:10
that come to? That's where you wanna pour your creativity. And
17:14
Right. And and that's where our best new ideas come from is by asking
17:18
that question. I gotta ask you this because, you
17:21
know, the part of my thing is, you know, having a bold
17:25
vision, you know, innovating during change and and and
17:29
working with your own unique, you know, your own uniqueness to
17:32
increase your profit. What would you say
17:37
that you wanna be remembered for at your 100th birthday?
17:41
You know, what is your vision of how you've had an impact on the world?
17:44
Mhmm. You know, I think I I want
17:48
my legacy to be, you know, that I was helpful,
17:53
that people were grateful that, you know,
17:56
they had a relationship with me in their life and that I,
18:00
in some way, was able to help them,
18:04
you know, achieve something that they wanted to achieve or live a better life
18:08
for them. And, you know you know, there's there's a difference
18:12
between tactics and and vision and mission.
18:16
My mission is simply to elevate the
18:19
well-being of of other humans. And
18:23
today, I do that through helping them implement
18:27
affiliate programs and get more clients and leads for their business.
18:31
That's my chosen path. Who who knows? Maybe a decade from
18:35
now, I'm called to do, you know, something else, but the mission will
18:39
remain the same, and that is to elevate the happiness and
18:42
well-being of other humans. And and that's what
18:46
drives me forward. And I think that that's the part that's really
18:49
important. I think, you know, you can start out with
18:53
a very small vision or mission, and it
18:57
can, you know, it can be more concentrated or it can get
19:00
bigger so that you're having a bigger impact. Alright. Let's have a little bit
19:04
of fun, though. Let's let's I I like to be practical. So
19:08
if there was some practical advice that you would give people about how they
19:12
could put what you learned into practice,
19:16
you know, when they walk away. Because I I I really feel like if you
19:19
learn something, you have to know how to apply it. Mhmm. So that you
19:23
can, you know, you can do it. So what would you what would be
19:27
the one thing it can you can do more say more than 1,
19:30
but at least 1 Mhmm. Piece of advice you would
19:34
give people? The well, my first piece of advice
19:38
is do yourself a favor and understand that this is
19:41
a process, not an event. And
19:45
and so people wanna be able to wave the magic wand and get an
19:49
instant result, and you have to be willing to do the
19:52
work. So first and foremost, you have to approach it with that mindset.
19:56
And then and then this is the hardest part,
20:00
and I struggled with this too, is you need to be able to let
20:04
go of that 80 to 90% of the things
20:08
that you are currently doing repeatedly
20:12
that are not producing your desired outcome. In fact,
20:15
they're probably even preventing you from getting your desired outcome.
20:19
You feel productive because you're busy all the time. And, you
20:23
know, I work hard a lot. You know, do I have to work 10,
20:26
12 hours a day? I don't. But I I'm doing things
20:30
that I love to do. And and so,
20:34
but, you know, you gotta be willing to let go of the things
20:38
that don't serve you. And it's been interesting because,
20:42
and, you know, one of my favorite authors, Dan Sullivan, says this all the time.
20:45
When you let go of that 80%, then that that
20:49
the 20% now grows and fills up that void.
20:54
And then, you know, every every so often, revisit
20:57
this, and you'll have a new 80% to get rid of and a
21:01
20% that's that's that's producing your results. So
21:05
probably every 6 to 12 months, have a check-in and say, what am
21:08
I currently doing? Is it contributing to my desired
21:12
outcome? And if it's the answer is no, either park it
21:16
or eliminate it. And but you gotta approach it
21:19
with with, you know, you gotta be you gotta be willing to let
21:23
go. And and a lot of times you can't do that by
21:26
yourself. I mean, you know, one of the things that that someone said,
21:31
I heard someone say recently is the brain that created this
21:34
problem is not the brain that can naturally solve it.
21:38
Do you know? So that's one of one of the good things about
21:42
working with other people and and, you know, because they can look at what you're
21:46
doing and go, wait. You don't need that. And and, you know, and that's
21:49
probably the thing that you're most wedded to. It's like, no. Not
21:53
this. Right?
21:58
So you've got something to offer us that we are gonna put in the notes.
22:01
Right? I do. What is that? Tell us more.
22:05
Awesome. Well, and and we've been hinting at it the whole time
22:08
because I talked about how my strategy is to do this one workshop
22:13
every single month. And, look, you're you're
22:17
getting this at a good time because if you came, you know, 2 years
22:21
the way I deliver that workshop today is at its absolute
22:24
best. It is exponentially better than it was 2 years ago because I do the
22:28
same workshop every single month, and I've developed mastery over
22:32
it. So this is my, my free
22:35
workshop. It's my free affiliate workshop where you're going to learn how to
22:39
get affiliates to send you clients and fill
22:43
your events. And and so if you want to
22:46
build your list, if you need more leads to be able
22:50
to sell your products or your services to, or if you're
22:54
hosting events such as webinars and challenges
22:57
and master classes and all of those things, There's no easier
23:01
way to to to accomplish that by using other people's
23:05
lists and creating partnerships or affiliate relationships with
23:09
other people. So you come to the workshop. You're going to learn
23:13
how to do that Step by step, you'll learn the tech and the
23:16
marketing and all of the things you need to do to be
23:20
successful with that. And, it's free. So come and
23:23
join me, and you'll get to see, you know, you'll get to see,
23:27
my mastery and but you'll also get to learn some really
23:31
practical things that you can put into,
23:34
into, practicing your business right away.
23:38
And and I just have to add my own little 2¢ to this.
23:44
One of the things that I love about Chuck is that he helps
23:48
you to do this in a way that is not salesy. This
23:51
is truly it this is truly a way to build a
23:55
community and connection and attract people that are
23:59
complement what you do that, you know, are happy to tell
24:03
other people about your business. It's not about putting out a sign and saying, you
24:06
know, everybody come in. You know, I got this for sale.
24:10
It's we're marked down today. It's not that kind of thing at all, and it
24:13
makes all the difference in the world, not only in the
24:17
relationships that you're building, but also in the results that you
24:21
get. I mean, it gives you, 3rd party
24:24
credibility. It brings you people that are already
24:28
slightly warm in terms of the leads. It it it it
24:32
is worth going to even if you're not thinking about doing affiliates,
24:35
the whole process and the thought process that goes through it is
24:39
definitely worth watching at least once. I mean, I sat through it a
24:43
couple times, both as as somebody for the
24:46
first time and repeat and then finally, you know, signing up to buy. So
24:50
that's full transparency. Alright. Let's end with my
24:54
last question, which is just kind of a fun question. When was the
24:57
last time that you did something for the first
25:01
time?
25:05
Great question. I'm gonna say
25:11
and it's hard to I challenge myself to do new
25:14
things all the time. Because if there's one thing theme from
25:18
this whole conversation is we don't need to do
25:22
we don't need to work more. We need to work different. So
25:26
I'm challenging myself to do that all the time. It
25:30
was I'm gonna say that it was Tuesday,
25:34
right, which was 2 days ago. And,
25:37
and so I was in a in the middle of a meeting, and,
25:41
you know, usually, you know, I'm
25:46
really I mean, really trying to stay focused on my
25:50
my other things. And one of the one of the
25:54
ideas is partnering and investing in other businesses, and and it and
25:58
it became very clear during that meeting that there was an
26:01
opportunity to become business partners with this person. And I
26:05
usually would say no to that or or not go there because that's not really
26:09
what I do. But it came up,
26:12
and it was impulsive is not the right
26:16
word. It just felt like it was the right thing to do at the right
26:20
time. And I'm like, you know what? That's not what we do,
26:24
but it's aligned, so let's go for it. And
26:27
and so so and that's going to, that's going
26:31
to, you know, spawn a whole other,
26:35
you know, hopefully, still focused and aligned
26:39
work, but something I would normally say no
26:43
to, I said yes to, and it feels like the right thing to
26:46
do. Fantastic. So, you know, we
26:50
probably could go on because we have many times. Yeah. But we need
26:54
to wind this up. And I just wanna say, make sure that, you know, one
26:58
of the ways that you can keep this going is that you subscribe, that you
27:01
check on, click is the word I'm looking
27:05
for. You click on the link for Chuck's, free
27:09
workshop, that you come back and hear who the other people.
27:12
We have a lot of interesting people lined up, entrepreneurs
27:16
that you can learn from. And, you know, the idea is that
27:20
we want you to take a look at this and find a
27:24
way to use it. So, you know, my philosophy is that you learn
27:27
something, Chuck has told you how to apply it. So the next thing is
27:31
that you share this with somebody so that you make sure that you understand
27:35
it and share the link so that they can go through that
27:38
experience with you because there is power in community and connection.
27:42
So, Chuck, thank you so much. And, like I
27:46
said, I am so glad that you joined me on the one small change where
27:49
we could take a look at the incredibly rocky
27:53
and exhilarating entrepreneurial journey both
27:56
with, you know, the ups and the downs and the innovative possibilities.
28:01
And, you know, I hope we'll see all of you next time. So stay curious
28:05
and join us again.