Success Stories - 12 Doers Share Their Secrets. Interview #10: Peter Twist

Written by Martin Avis


There are lots of ways to makerepparttar Internet work for you. Although selling a product online isrepparttar 118942 most obvious business model, it certainly isn'trepparttar 118943 only way.

This interview, with British voice-over artist, Peter Twist, shows how he has harnessedrepparttar 118944 Internet's potential. Not only is he selling products, but he is also selling himself, his services and those of his colleagues.

Truly a man who understandsrepparttar 118945 power of multiple streams of income.

BizE-zine: Peter, who are you and what is your background?

PT: My name is Peter Twist, I'm 41 and I live partly in London UK and partly in Monaco.

My bread and butter is as a voice-over for TV and Radio inrepparttar 118946 UK and abroad. As I work for myself it has been easy to work this andrepparttar 118947 Internet alongside each other.

I am probably one ofrepparttar 118948 best-known "unknown" voices:repparttar 118949 guy who promotes Classic FM Magazine and sometimes tells you what's on TV on Saturday night. I occasionally do work for clients inrepparttar 118950 US as well.

BizE-zine: When did you discoverrepparttar 118951 power ofrepparttar 118952 Internet?

PT: I first got involved about 8 years ago. I went online by joining CompuServe with a 2.5k modem! I initially set up a web site to promote my voice-over work. In this business you spend a lot of time giving prospective clients details about yourself and demo tapes. Being lazy I put it all onrepparttar 118953 web site with streaming audio files and told people to go there.

BizE-zine: Did it work?

PT: Putting my voice-over information onrepparttar 118954 Internet did work. It saved me having to send out CDs and tapes. It was also fairly easy to get a good search engine ranking for 'voice-over' or 'voice talent' so I did get a lot of referrals fromrepparttar 118955 web.

If it was a choice between me and another voice who was sending stuff to prospective clients by snail mail, it gave merepparttar 118956 edge.

At aboutrepparttar 118957 same time, 8 years ago,repparttar 118958 voice-over world had a major upheaval. ISDN telephone lines came in. I went from driving around 60,000 miles a year to allrepparttar 118959 major radio stations inrepparttar 118960 UK, to building a studio at home and talking down an ISDN line.

So I was already beginning to experiencerepparttar 118961 benefits of technology even beforerepparttar 118962 Internet started to grow.

BizE-zine: What was your next Internet development as far asrepparttar 118963 voice-over work was concerned?

PT: Now that allrepparttar 118964 voices were at home waiting for work,repparttar 118965 radio stations and production companies began asking for weekly faxes listing a voice-over's availability. Fairly soon they were getting up to 200 faxes per week. Every time they needed a voice, they would have to trawl through these faxes to find out whether or notrepparttar 118966 voice was available, and of course that availability would change sorepparttar 118967 producer would have to telephonerepparttar 118968 voice artist too.

So where doesrepparttar 118969 Internet come in? I thought to myself how much better it would be to go to a web site and seerepparttar 118970 list of voices and whether or not they were available on that day.

Atrepparttar 118971 time, onlyrepparttar 118972 really big companies could afford their own programmers to write specialist software like this, so I beganrepparttar 118973 idea using Microsoft Front Page. Each day around 50 voice artists would email me and I would updaterepparttar 118974 site. Phew, hard work! Also, if I put 'no' instead of 'yes' for their availability I was in big trouble! A few voices did ask whether they could update their own pages, but it wasn't possible unless I invested around $30,000 in software development.

Eventually, about 9 months ago, I finally managed to find and adapt some web-based software that allowed allrepparttar 118975 voice-overs to log in, and change their own details. There are currently around 35 voice-overs onrepparttar 118976 site and around 100-150 producers access it on a daily basis.

http://www.powercomm.co.uk/isdn

The key is not massive amounts of traffic; it's finding and filling a niche. The site is paid for byrepparttar 118977 voices, it generates around $15,000 per year. That may not sound like much but consider that it's renewable, regular income, and I don't have any ongoing labor:repparttar 118978 voices do allrepparttar 118979 work!

BizE-zine: You got started by selling yourself and your colleagues, but what happened next?

PT: Next I did what everyone seems to do - I tried to sell other people's products.

I followed allrepparttar 118980 strategies for advertising and promotion but saw that there were many more people who were better at it than me and had more patience. So, after about three months, (I have no patience at all!), I decided to takerepparttar 118981 other route, produce my own product and letrepparttar 118982 good marketers sell it.

I just kept seeingrepparttar 118983 same products being sold over and over again, and it was alwaysrepparttar 118984 marketers withrepparttar 118985 best mailing lists (their own opt-in lists) who sucked up allrepparttar 118986 sales because they had already established themselves. You really have to hand it to those marketers who push stuff day after day and never give up.

BizE-zine: Let's get philosophical for a moment. You already had a successful offline business - what need did Internet marketing fulfill in your life?

PT: I was attracted torepparttar 118987 Internet mainly because I could seerepparttar 118988 potential audience andrepparttar 118989 ability it gave you to work at your own pace, at times that suited you.

I had always envied writers (novel & song) who could live anywhere, and, if they were successful, live off royalties.

Yet, I could see that for every successful novel and songwriter there were thousands of others who weren't. In large part s seemed to be because other people control their destiny. If your face doesn't fit, you have no chance.

The Internet creates a level playing field; you get a chance to letrepparttar 118990 buying public decide whether or not they like you.

I loverepparttar 118991 "unknown territory" ofrepparttar 118992 Internet, it's relatively inexpensive to test and you get results, good or bad within hours.

BizE-zine: You are very much a 'have a go' person, Peter. What checks and balances do you apply to your ideas prior to jumping in?

PT: Whatever project I've thought up, I always like to look atrepparttar 118993 end result and then work out how to get there. If you analyzed any new venture and allrepparttar 118994 things that could go wrong, you would never begin anything!

BizE-zine: So how did your business develop?

PT: I thought this web-based stuff was really something so I looked for other niches that would benefit and I thought of auto dealers, real estate businesses and travel agents. I have started off with auto dealers and have begun selling sites likerepparttar 118995 one here: http://www.hendymotorsales.co.uk

All these guys need is a digital camera and a connection torepparttar 118996 Internet and no specialized software.

Because I have my own servers I make money by setting up domains and renting web space to people.

BizE-zine: Then, as if you didn't have enough going on, you created your own info products to sell. How did that come about?

PT: I really like to help other people and have always been a fan of Brian Tracy and Anthony Robbins who are great motivational speakers. I love listening again and again to their tapes and CDs. To me it is better than just reading a book - I find it much more enjoyable.

Learning the Lessons of the Dot-Bomb Era

Written by Bill Platt


Duringrepparttar late 1990's, banks and investors were falling all over themselves to invest inrepparttar 118941 new dot com companies wanting to go public.

Whilerepparttar 118942 owners of those companies became paper millionaires overnight, that does not mean much if they did not sell their stocks whenrepparttar 118943 price was still high. I am willing to bet that most did not. Instead, they believed in what they were doing and carried their paper millions with them to bankruptcy court.

As small business owners, we do not haverepparttar 118944 IPO millions to burn. We have to be more careful and thoughtful with our dollars.

As small business people, we often tell ourselves... "If only we had more money to advertise our wares, we would be very successful in our endeavors."

Yet,repparttar 118945 failed dot com's who are now mockingly referred to as "Dot Bombs", had millions to burn on advertising. So what in repparttar 118946 world happened? Where did those miraculous, wondrous and theoretical profits go?

Between January of 2000 andrepparttar 118947 end of February, 2002, at least 806 dot com companies went under according to Webmergers.com.

There are a number of lessons we can learn fromrepparttar 118948 Dot Bombs, and every lesson learned will permit us to realizerepparttar 118949 elusive Internet profits thatrepparttar 118950 big boys failed to manifest.

LESSON ONE:

Almost without fail, all Dot Bomb's presented unproven, theoretical models torepparttar 118951 banks for their Initial Public Offerings. They had never shown a profit and never would becauserepparttar 118952 models they used could not work.

Whenrepparttar 118953 bottom fell out ofrepparttar 118954 Internet advertising market, repparttar 118955 companies whose business models were based on selling advertising on their sites or in their networks wererepparttar 118956 first losers. Many faced 80% drops in revenue nearly overnight.

You and I wererepparttar 118957 winners. We can now post our advertising on some really high traffic, high profile web sites at very reasonable prices.

Our lesson here is that we must establish our business on a business model that can be profitable at low volumes before we can even hope to be profitable at high volumes. Cash is notrepparttar 118958 secret to online profits! Rather, a solid business model isrepparttar 118959 first secret to online profits.

LESSON TWO:

The dangerous thing about being a public company in a new and unproven marketplace is that your investors are constantly clamoring to see a return for their money.

Most startup companies grow into a profitable enterprise because they have an entrepreneur atrepparttar 118960 helm. An entrepreneur is a risk-taker by definition. He or she is willing to gamble and take chances, even to changerepparttar 118961 direction of a company if repparttar 118962 road ahead looks dangerous or unprofitable.

With stock holders breathing down ones neck, this kind of flexibility ceases to exist inrepparttar 118963 grand scheme of things.

The lesson is that as a small business owner, we can and must remain flexible. Most especially in an untested and unproven market, we need to sustain our flexibility and keep our eyes on our bottom line andrepparttar 118964 marketplace. Don't fear change. One day, change could very well become your saving grace.

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