The Aptitude Doc

And it airs today!

It was a great pleasure to talk with Elizabeth Potts Weinstein, host of The Wealth Spa radio show, for the Business channel of VoiceAmerica.com.

We discussed the lure of Internet marketing, the (often overlooked) importance of identifying your strongest skills and aptitude, and the enriched likelihood of success experienced by those who do.

Elizabeth is a wonderful interviewer and has a terrific weekly show.

My interview will premiere today at 2PM Eastern/11AM Pacific on a computer near you. All you need to do is click on this link and it will start playing: Wealth Spa Radio

I also will be posting the mp3 here as soon as I can, so if you miss the show check the links to the right to download it.

Please let me know what you think by leaving a comment here.
The Aptitude Doc

The biggest frustration in Internet Marketing is not finding out HOW to make money; it’s deciding HOW NOT to make money.

Huh? Think about it.

We gather huge amounts of knowledge, learn methods that have brought success to other people, endlessly buy information products and software. We very quickly amass a lot of information — much more, really, than we need for ourselves to succeed online.

That’s because most of that know-how is stuff that ultimately doesn’t fit with the business model that is right for us as individuals. All it accomplishes is to confuse, to further muddy the waters we’re having trouble seeing through clearly, anyway.

Learning how to succeed online is in many ways like playing a game of cards. We draw cards and add them to our hand. Then we decide what set of cards will give us the best odds at winning and discard the rest.

But life isn’t that simple, right?

Maybe not at first thought, but in reality, it can be.

This is often the single hardest challenge we face as online marketers. And, just like in cards, only the people who do it will win.

You see, all that knowledge quickly becomes overwhelming. It’s as if we keep drawing but never get rid of any cards. We need a filter, something that will help us to see the best option for ourselves and then be able to discard the rest so that the winning hand stays in focus.

That filter is actually inside every one of us. It’s just difficult to see it sometimes. It’s a measuring stick made up of our personal strengths, our own unique set of skills and aptitudes. By identifying those, we will know what we must keep in order to build the best hand. And discard the rest.

Asking yourself simple but specific questions can engage that filter and help you identify your own powerful set of tools and how to best put them to use.

Start by taking the free self-discovery quiz at MapYourAptitude and studying the free mindmap of online business models and what is required for each. Then we’ll discuss some of the options that are the best for YOU. Oh, and you did hear me say this was all free, right?

Learn what your best winning hand is and discover what unneeded information you can finally allow yourself to discard.

Because if we don’t discard, we won’t win. And all we’ll have is a handful of cards.

MapYourAptitude

Are you a screwdriver in a room full of nails?

If you are like most of the people I talk with, you probably are, or at least were at one time.

You see, each of us possesses a unique set of tools, personal strengths that we are good at and enjoy doing. And when our time is spent utilizing them, we get a lot more done in a lot less time and enjoy it a lot more. THAT is a winning plan!

As an example, if your sharpest tool is:

• Writing — then blogging, article writing, email marketing or ebooks might provide good income;

• Working with numbers — then pay-per-click affiliate marketing or lead generation could pay off quickly;

• Interaction with others — then coaching or interview products might be easily profitable for you.

I have created a simple and free 7-question quiz that will help YOU match your strongest assets to an online marketing path. And when you complete it, I will also send you a mindmap that clearly defines some of the necessary tools for the various ways to profit on the Internet.

Discover YOUR Best Online Success Path . It’s fun, easy, and enlightening.

If you’re a screwdriver and all you see is nails, why force yourself to become hammer?

Just find the screws!

Welcome to TheAptitudeDoc.com.

My goal in creating this site is to help others discover the strengths and traits they bring to their online business and aid in matching them to a business model that is well suited to them. Eliminating frustrations and activities that don’t fit well with the individual’s strengths will yield more productivity and faster accomplishment, and that, of course, leads to greater (and/or quicker) profits.

As a professor of education and music, I have helped countless students prepare to embark on their professional careers,. Through self-discovery, one can identify his or her own strengths and then learn to focus on those in order to become the most effective and successful.

The same holds true in online business.

Regardless of specific niche or area of expertise, we have at our disposal an almost endless array of tools through which success can be attained on the Internet. And we are constantly bombarded with an increasing deluge of promotions, all of which promise that they are the golden key to Web success.

What results is overload—crippling, energy-zapping overload. It is as if our goal on the Web is to try every possible business model and when the wealth doesn’t come, move onto the next hot new "method" that promises success.

Result: Forcing yourself into a business model instead of fitting the business model to you.

Instead, choose the best business model for your own set of strengths and apply all your energies to it. And don’t allow yourself to be distracted by anything that isn’t part of your plan.

• Why try to write an ebook if that isn’t a pleasurable task that comes easily to you? (Yet, look at how many spend months or even years trying to do exactly that. How about making some money instead!)
• If you are mathematically challenged, is mastering complex return-on-investment formulas and multi-variate testing of ads, both integral aspects of successful pay-per-click marketing, the best use of your time?
• If you like to work with people, wouldn’t it make sense to choose a path that would allow you to actually interact with people, perhaps through one-on-one or group coaching, masterminds, or live seminars?
• If it takes you a long time to do technical things with Websites, don’t choose a model that necessitates great involvement "behind the scenes," like setting up complex marketing scripts.

I’m sure you get the idea. If your screwdriver collection is world-class, don’t build something held together by nails.

Take my free & easy 7-question aptitude-discovery quiz at http://www.MapYourAptitude.com and receive my free mindmap illustrating what makes the various online business models tick.

To YOUR best success!