The lesson from Chester…

Update: Shawn posted his response (Counterpoint) here: No room for wet cats in affiliate marketing/

Well I am trying something new here… at least new to me.  In this post, I am going to argue a certain side… and then reach out at the end of the post to a friend of mine who (if he accepts the invitation) will provide an alternate point of view.

POINT:  (see all the way at the bottom for COUNTERPOINT)

I watched a video today that (while also making me laugh quite a bit) displayed some of the qualities that I love about affiliate marketers.  As an affiliate network, we work with a ton of great affiliates who inspire me everyday with innovative ideas. Please keep in mind that this video is not my content, it comes from a website called Break.com …  the link to the video is here:

In the video, the subject… I’ll call him “Chester” for the purposes of this blog post, was presented with a conundrum that a lot of us face today.  How he handled it, I am arguing, makes him just like one of the thousands of entrepreneurial affiliate marketers that we work with every day. (You’ll need to watch the video to understand this post… so please go ahead – and I’ll wait for you to return :) )

The lessons that I learned from Chester:

Never be afraid to take the leap.

Every day I hear a new story from an affiliate or affiliate manager who saw an opportunity to fill a niche in this world and took a big jump to try to fill it.

The lesson from Chester:  Be brave.  This economy is not an obstacle that cannot be overcome.  If you see an opportunity, go out there and go after it.  If a cat can stick it’s head in a fountain of water just to get a drink…anything is possible.  A further lesson from Chester here is to be brave while at the same time being smart.  He could have jumped in a toilet, for example… but that wouldn’t have been as smart a move.

Adapt to your surroundings.

While I don’t know Chester personally, I have to assume (for the purposes of this post) that for whatever reason… his usual water supply was unavailable or was somehow unsuitable.

There are dozens of marketing channels, and that is only counting the ones that are already out there.  I’ve argued this point before… but it applies to this post:  So many affiliate marketers out there are relying on only one channel to bring in the majority of their traffic.  If this channel were to suddenly change to the point of being unuseable, most of those affiliates would be left without a large chunk of their business.  Get out there and find new sources… build communities, develop loyal followers, find new and innovative ways to reach customers etc…

The lesson from Chester:  Adapt.  If your water bowl were somehow taken away from you, would you be able to stick your head under a faucet – even if you were a cat!  (Cats are notoriously afraid of water … for those non-cat lovers.)

Don’t worry if you don’t get it all right…

Clearly I think we could all agree this is not the most efficient way to drink. However, Chester is unfazed by this. He sticks his head in and fails to get any water probably 99% of the time. However, he presses on. In Affiliate Marketing there are so many failures… so many ideas that didn’t work out, so many websites that couldn’t generate traffic – but the beauty of it is that if you keep at it and continue, you’ll get your drink of water too.

The lesson from Chester: Persevere.

To summarize:  I think Chester (I’m certain that is not his name, by the way) is not dumb at all… as the video title suggests … but instead showed guts, ingenuity and initiative.  A lot of those qualities are exactly those needed to be a successful affiliate marketer and entreprenuer.

As a fun addition to this post, I’d like to invite my friend and fellow affiliate marketer, Shawn Collins, to provide a “Counterpoint”.  I’ve argued why Chester “succeeded” in this video… but I’d like to hear how he failed.  Shawn, you up for it?

UPDATE: Good news, Shawn has accepted my invitation to Counterpoint this post – and is currently crafting his argument.