Back in the Game

This week I’ve been re-committing to John Thornhill’s Partnership to Success Programme, which I started back in September 2016!

I thought it would be a good idea to post up my experience, and why I’ve concluded that it’s better to keep pushing and see something through than to give up and try to come back to it later.

I’m embarrassed to say that I fell off this programme back in November 2017, after I let a disappointing sticking point demoralise me and stop me moving forward. I then took on a long-term project for a client (see final paragraph), which I’ve now just completed, so now I’m back and determined to properly see this programme through.

I’m now revisiting the first 13 weeks’ modules again, as I’m aware that quite a few things have changed over the last 20 months!  I’ve been busy fixing what has broken and updating what needs to be updated.

Here are the lessons I’ve learned from trying to pick up where I left off…

Things change

And they can change fast and in a big way, especially when it comes to technology. What worked yesterday won’t necessarily work today, so it’s important to stay current and regularly check for broken web links, WordPress updates, new comments, etc.

Don’t give up when things get tough…keep pushing through and asking for help. Don’t sabotage your own success by ‘playing the victim’

Previous to this programme, I had joined another one which had involved product creation, but the guy was such a guru that I felt intimidated by him and was afraid to ask for help. Despite paying him a lot of money I felt embarrassed that I might be taking up too much of his time asking questions on his the live calls; I did it once and he said he had an idea about how he could help me, but then I never heard back from him and that was that. I didn’t push for a follow-up, I just got disappointed and gave up.

Fast forward to John’s programme and, this time, I was determined that if I got stuck I would push for an answer. I booked a call with John, but he wasn’t available so Randy jumped on a call with me. I’d come up with a product idea and sent it over, only to receive the feedback that I should provide proof that it produces results before I started working on a sales page. I’m not going to lie, that pissed me off. On every programme I’ve ever signed up for, there seems to have been some kind of ‘catch’ they never talk about when it’s being sold to you; this time the ‘catch’ appeared to be “here’s a programme to help you make money online; we’ll show you, step by step, how to create a product, then we’ll help market it for you…but here’s the catch, first you have to prove it makes money online before we can help you make money online by selling it!“.

Ok, so Randy explained that, in order to convince people to buy the product, it’s not essential, but will sell significantly better, if you can demonstrate some evidence of the results gained from your product; and those results don’t have to be financial; it could, for example, be a weight loss programme, with evidence that people who have followed it have lost weight.

The results don’t have to be massive either – Randy pointed out that it can actually help sales if you’re showing that your product has made you some money, but not HUGE amounts, because that feels more believable and achievable to your audience than something that claims to make thousands of dollars a month.

But, for me, the damage had been done; I’d been kicked in the balls and my momentum had vanished. I should have gone to the facebook group for help, encouragement and support, but I didn’t. I moved on and found something else to do.

It’s a big waste of time and money

Having decided to recommit to this programme, I’m having to go through all the videos again, but now, because some things have changed, I can’t just simply follow the instructions, because some things I’ve already done and some I haven’t. I guess I could if I started from scratch, but that would take even MORE time. So, basically, it’s been a case of fixing what’s broken and deciding whether to upgrade things that are still working, but are not what John’s using now.

Money wise, I’ve spent the last year and a half still paying for D9 hosting, Optimize Press and Aweber, but without making any money from the programme which recommended I buy them, because I haven’t seen the programme through to the point where I have my own product to sell or am earning affiliate commissions.

I could beat myself up about that, but it’s worth remembering that if I’d given up completely, I would have also wasted the initial money I paid for the course in the first place. This leads me nicely on to my final lesson.

If you want to succeed in the future, you have to forgive yourself for what’s happened in the past

Ok, so I screwed up; if I’d stuck with the programme at the time and been determined to overcome any obstacles and see it through, who knows where I would be now, some 20 months later? BUT, I’m proud of myself for deciding to give this programme another go, so, in that respect, I haven’t given up. I’m learning from this lesson and moving forward. I’m determined now to see this through and make it work because I don’t want this to be yet another programme that I purchased and didn’t get results from.

I don’t have my HOW yet, but I do have my WHY; and that, actually, is more important. A journey only reveals the next steps as you take the ones before.

So, have I been completely wasting my time away from the programme? Well no because, whilst it didn’t pay brilliantly, I’ve spent the last year and a half working on the very rewarding project of helping a client fulfil his lifetime dream to make history freely available to everyone in a new and fun way. So if you like history, or are a history teacher, or have children studying history, I encourage you to check out this amazing completely free to use online history resource called Timewise Traveller. It’s a highly accurate account of world history, but cleverly and uniquely organised using the reigns of all the English Kings and Queens from William the Conqueror in 1066 to Queen Victoria in 1901. I’ve never seen a work like it and am very pleased and proud of how it’s turned out.