I was wrong about niching down... pivoting is easier with a niche.

[Steve Brownlie]

Just a thought here as a lot of us are reinventing ourselves, exploring new revenue streams etc. I thought I was clever being broad and general.

It seemed to make sense at the time. Lots of people want links just do links for everyone.

But most of my market was niche affiliate site owners (experts in SEO spamming? lol). People smart enough to know what moves the needle and evaluate our work etc. That market as we all know got hit hard.

Most agencies don't care because their clients churn a lot anyway, and they struggle a lot anyway with tight margins, so they just want to buy cheap marketplace links and be done with it. They don't care that what we do is different or even what a natural link is as long as it hits their client's silly KPIs.

I kinda regret not being 'the SEO agency for ... i dunno pest control' or something. You get the idea.

Then when the 'new shiny thing' comes you can easily be the 'automation implementation guy for... pest control' and already have the customers and mailing list. Even past customers might come back to you for the new shiny thing because their SEO they left you for 2 years ago doesn't do it etc.

But when your mailing list is 'random' and 60% of them went out of business since you started over a decade ago and had to be leaned out... building those coherent upsells and pivots is a lot harder.

So yeah I was wrong about that for sure. I know it's 'guru' advice so I could easily have listened to any one of all our 'favourites' lol but for whatever reason I was blind to the obvious.

 

[eliquid]

I don't think it's that easy.

You might not have been the SEO guy for "Pest Control". but you might have had 1 or 2 of those Pest Control clients instead of 100.

If the 2 pest control clients you had went out of business, like in your example... what makes you think that all 100 didn't go out as well?

Whoever is left of them ( maybe 3 out of 100 ), might be ones that stayed in business.. but decided to jump out of SEO and go into PPC.. or put SEO on hold. What would you really do with 1, 2, or 3 clients now when you pivot?

BTW, this is how guys like me catch scammers and fraudsters.

One year they are the Google Local maps pack guru, the next year the RAPE links experts, the next year the golden triangle links pack guru, the next the rented website SEO experts, then the AEO expert, then the automation SEO expert, etc.

If they were GOOD at anything, they would still be GOOD in it. Not chasing the next butterfly every 6 to 12 months. If you were GOOD at something why would you abandon it and all the month you are making in it, to chase a new dream and start at $0 now?

When people pivot all the time and never talk again about the stuff they claimed they were an expert in anymore, that's how I know someone was lying. Other people are watching this too.

Only genuinely jump ship if it's 100% dead. Pivot too many times, and we can all see that as a negative,

I see plenty of "agencies" or freelancers hit that big ol list after shit hits the fan, and they still are doing it. So it must still work to draw in clients.

There is a designer who use to be big here and on Wickedfire. Guy passed away in another country and his brother took the business over like 6 months to a year later and still sends out emails.

 

[Hanuman]

When people pivot all the time and never talk again about the stuff they claimed they were an expert in anymore, that's how I know someone was lying. Other people are watching this too.

Only genuinely jump ship if it's 100% dead. Pivot too many times, and we can all see that as a negative,

Good point. But I am going to counter that and say nobody other than yourself is watching you every minute. Heck, even if you are marketing yourself on LinkedIn, the algorithm ensures hardly a small chunk of your followers see it.

So, if you are a 'fail often, fail fast' kind of a person, keep pivoting and experimenting. But give everything a good solid few months or years to ensure you really cannot make it in there.

 

[eliquid]

Good point. But I am going to counter that and say nobody other than yourself is watching you every minute. Heck, even if you are marketing yourself on LinkedIn, the algorithm ensures hardly a small chunk of your followers see it.

So, if you are a 'fail often, fail fast' kind of a person, keep pivoting and experimenting. But give everything a good solid few months or years to ensure you really cannot make it in there.

Good counter. I understand the counter.

I'd have to genuinely say, there are a tons of people watching you every minute. If not... than facebook, instagram, youtube, and tons of other social media platforms ( including reality TV ) WOULD NOT work.

Sure you have people mindlessly doom scrolling and trying to get a dopamine fix on new entertainment. That is where your counter would work.

But there is a whole other side of it. People obsessed with the Kardashians, fans of XYZ small town food reviewer, people watching every move their ex makes ( or their arch enemy in ABC niche ). Tons of silent watchers.

I remember a convo with someone ( you know who you are when you read this, lol ) that would always say ( and im summarizing here high level ) - "Im going to put that in my file about them". There are millions of people doing this. I know I do it to others, I know they do it with me, and I know its happening daily all over.

And it goes past the algo. It doesnt matter if LinkedIn or YouTube show only a small %. You are forgetting the people that go to your actual page/channel and watch everything there. The algo is just 1 small piece for the "doom scroller", not the person watching for other reasons.

And trust me, there are a ton of those.

All it takes is 1 of us, 1 person - to see someone say something today that counters what they said 3 years ago.. and someone digs it up and reposts the counter for all of social media to see.

The logical problem I have with:

So, if you are a 'fail often, fail fast' kind of a person, keep pivoting and experimenting. But give everything a good solid few months or years to ensure you really cannot make it in there.

Is that person 90% of the time, during this fail fast movement plan, they position themselves as the expert or know it all or top authority or person to listen to while doing their "fail fast".

Then they fail and pivot - Ok.

But they aren't going back and taking down the posts, the videos, the info. They aren't going back and saying "hey I was wrong, dont follow this now" and they aren't deleting it so that other NEW people finding it later don't get send down a rabbit hole of issues and problems from their "wrong advice".

And if that person is doing this, and I and others see it... how am I to trust anything else they do in the future? How do I know if it's just another wannabe fake guru on their new topic now?

It takes years to build a reputation, and minutes to destroy it.

I have nothing against the person that pivots. I have something against the person that claims they are the one to listen to ( about SEO, PPC, etc ) and then now they are selling Ai consulting and agent flows and selling bots and never talk about their SEO and PPC or w/e topic again.

If you were the top person, the top 1%.. the authority. Your SEO and PPC should still be working right? Why did you abandon it and switch to selling $47 ebooks and Claude skills now with your $199 Skool Ai group? Surely your top 1% skills in SEO and PPC still work - or was it all a lie?

The trust is gone now. Their brand is tainted. Anything they say is now snake oil.

I for one am glad these people never take down their old posts and videos. It serves as evidence when I find it, they have no clue what they are talking about. And if they can boast when wrong and switch it up later and not correct their past.. its good evidence for me and others to not listen to them in the future.

I can't control what other people do and dont do ( dont fact check, dont look back in time, research out people ).. but that is why certain people get ahead in life, and others fall to the waste side.

 

[eliquid]

This is why I say, when I see someone switching up stuff every 12 months, and never talking about the old stuff again - we all see it.

We all know what it means.

In March they were claiming they run $5m a month in paid ads spend for Hermes and AGI and Lush and make them $35m back in paid ads.. and how their experience qualifies them as the top dog.

4 months later their channel and post are all about selling Ai customer service bots to SaaS companies - nothing any more about their paid ads stuff. Nothing.

Their Ai stuff isnt even about paid ads.

You don't find that a tad suspicious?