“The truth is incontrovertible; malice may attack it, ignorance may deride it, but in the end, there it is. “-Winston Churchill

One of the things I have obviously taught my kids is to tell the truth. And it is true that the “truth can set you free.” You see, without the truth you can’t make decisions and take actions based on accurate thinking.

So I’m about to tell you a big truth that will undoubtedly cost me some sales, but it’s something that needs to be said.

In a response to my blog post yesterday, one of my subscribers wrote the following, “Since I have NO “DEE-nero” at all, my main marketing is through Youtube vids, blog postings, Clickbank, and Twitter.”

Well, here is the reality that almost all of the gurus fail to tell you about:

If you have NO “DEE-nero” to invest in marketing, building a business is going to be a difficult and very slow proposition.

Notice that I did NOT say that it is impossible but rather that it would be slow and difficult.

The TRUTH is that an information products/coaching business must be run like a real business if you are going to be successful, and real businesses invest money in starting their businesses and in marketing.

The GREAT thing about the information products business is that it can be started very inexpensively compared to a traditional business. Think about how much a dentist, chiropractor, lawyer, financial planner, etc. has to invest not only in his or her education, not only in marketing, but in just getting the business off the ground. In the case of the dentist, it costs tens of thousands of dollars before he or she even opens the doors.

So what makes people think that they can have a successful information products business without investing any “DEE-nero” – especially “DEE-nero” in marketing?

Again, the beauty of the infoproducts biz is that it does not take a lot of “DEE-nero,” and there are many “free” ways to market your business online… BUT by only using “free” methods, it is going to take you a while to ramp up your business.

For example, let’s say you and your friend want to start an infoproducts biz in the golf niche. You say you have NO “DEE-nero” and need to use free methods to market your business. Your friend, on the other hand, decides that he is very serious about getting into the business and invests in direct mail, ads in golf magazines, paid email advertising and Google Adwords. Who do you think has a better chance of growing their business more quickly?

Notice that I said “chance.” Investing  “DEE-nero” in  marketing does not GUARANTEE your success. In fact, it can be a detriment if you spend it without knowing what you’re doing.  But with everything being equal, the person who can invest the most “DEE-nero” to acquire customers is going to win.

I did not invest a lot of money to start my information products business 13 years ago, but I did invest some. I placed an ad in a magazine. I sent direct mail. I bought programs that taught me how to do it right. When I saw there was life, I invested more “DEE-nero” in my marketing, and the more “DEE-nero” I invested the quicker my business grew. (And just so you know, before my magician infoproducts biz, I tried other businesses which failed  where I lost “DEE-nero” and  where I went into debt. That is the risk we take as entrepreneurs.)

This post is not meant to discourage you. Quite the opposite. With accurate thinking, you can set realistic expectations plan accordingly and not expect miracles.  You can build your business on the cheap; it is just going to take you a lot longer to get to where you want to go, and you should be prepared for that.

The only scenario where you have NO CHANCE of success is if you have no “DEE-nero” to invest in your business and do not want to invest a lot of your time into building it either.  Heck, when I started out to perform magic full time, I barely had any “DEE-nero” to invest in my business. (Buying a roll of stamps to send out letters was a BIG deal. Buying my first lead generation ad was even a bigger deal.)

The only real asset I had was my time, and I worked tirelessly and took massive action in order to even begin to see a trickle of results. When the trickle began, I poured the effort and time on even more and invested even more “DEE-nero” in growing my business and in my education to grow my business. Soon that trickle became a steady pour and then turned into a gusher. And guess what? I repeated the same process to start my infoproducts business selling to magicians.

So yes, you can use “free” methods to build your business, but you better be prepared to work tirelessly at it. Are you prepared to do that? Are you really willing to do whatever it takes? This means if you already have a job and are already working a lot of hours, that you are going to have to put in even more HOURS growing your other business.

And the TRUTH is, even if you have “DEE-nero” to invest in your marketing, you are still going to have to put in the time to succeed in your new business. But actually investing “DEE-nero” in your marketing can help you get there a lot faster.

If you have any questions or comments about this article, feel free to post a comment here on my blog

Have a great weekend!

Kick butt, make mucho “DEE-nero!”

Dave Dee

P.S. By the way, by telling you these real deal truths, I am doing the complete opposite of what you’re “supposed” to do in direct marketing: hype up the benefits, and play down the negatives. (A note to the gurus: This does not mean flat out lie. That is not direct marketing. That is deceit marketing.) More truths and a complete model for having a real information products/coaching business will be revealed during my new webinar next Thursday.  Registration opens Monday.