Cathy is one of my new found friends here in cold Montreal.

She’s a wine connaisseur and everytime I visit, she picks out a bottle from her cellar to share with me.

She knows all about the glasses you have to use – and why – she knows regions, and grapes, and all kinds of associated wine-y stuff.

Needless to say, since we’ve become friends I’ve upped my wine knowledge considerably. Which is great because in the past I’ve always been stumped about the type of wine to order with dinner.

In fact, today I went to the bookstore and got a basic wine guide so I could further educate myself.

To be honest with you… I never imagined actually sitting down and learning about wines. But Cathy’s sommelier-like interest sparked my curiousity.

And that brings me to the main point for today’s post.

As 2007 rapidly approaches many of you will be making your New Year’s resolutions.

Maybe you want to lose weight, or drink more water, or stop cussing, or make more money.

Just keep in mind that it’s your wits – your writing – your ability to create salable material that keeps money in your pocket.

And most writers who live this life – and live it well – will confess to being prolific in many different subjects. Or at least semi-prolific. Kind of like a jack-of-all-trades-master-of-none in the knowledge department.

I mean honestly if I read about the Internet and marketing all day and night I’d be both bored shitless, and an incredibly dull writer.

(So for those of you who say you’ve read every marketing ebook out there, and you’re not getting any closer to reaching your goals, now you have an idea why.)

Expanding your mind horizonally is an important act to fulfill in this game.

Your creative brain needs to absorb ideas outside of the marketing realm to really create a synthesis that excites you and your readers.

With that said, my New Years resolution for 2007 is this… to read about and/or experience 2 totally new topics every month.

Not necessarily to become an encyclopedic expert on every thing. Just to gain insight into other aspects of life that I may have never noticed.

In 2006 I did this on a smaller scale by teaching myself how to sew and do hand embroidery.

As a result, I’ve found many flaws within existing sewing manuals that I might be able to write about in my own ebook. Just the way things are explained can be horribly confusing for a novice seamstress. 

The concept of expanding your horizons is such a simple idea.

You might be tempted to dismiss it with a cursory “Yeah right, as if I don’t have enough on my plate already…”

But consider this… the curse isn’t knowing too much. It comes from knowing too little. The more you know, the more you can build upon.

Be a sponge in 2007 and grow rich,

Alexis Dawes

Being an expat has a lot of advantages – and disadvantages.

It’s difficult not having any family members around. Especially for my daughter. And sometimes for me.

But on the upside when people at the fruit stand, or coffee shop, or at my daughters school realize I’m a single parent in a foreign city, they tend to look out for me.

For example, since I’ve recuperated from my dislocated knee cap summer, I’ve been to no less than 7 dinner parties.

Over the past 2 nights I’ve been to two kid-friendly dinner parties.

Last nights party led me to a Bulgarian mom who was studying fashion marketing, and knew Bulgarian, Russian, Japanese and English. She’s now taking French here in Montreal.

Then there was the young single dad who was on sabbatical.

The hosts were Colombians who recently immigrated to Montreal, and were also studying French.

With that said, do YOU see an ebook here?

I do.

How did the Bulgarian mom manage to learn so many foreign languages? I mean we’re talking about languages with different alphabets. And she can speak, write and read them all.

How does a single dad survive on a sabbatical for a year? What insights and tips can he give to other single dads? (Who have far less support and information than single moms.)

My point here is that people – not necessarily the Internet – are THE true wealth of information.

Everybody (including myself) likes to take the ‘faceless’ way out, when it comes to researching a topic.

We look up articles, we read books, we e-mail experts we’ve never seen. And it works.

But… sometimes it’s even more effective to step out of your faceless comfort zone and meet real people.

Meetup.com offers all kinds of groups in most major cities around the world. It’s an easy way to expand your horizons in a structured environment.

Wanna write an ebook about poker? Join a poker meetup group. Writing an ebook about an alternative health topic? Join an alternative health meetup group.

And don’t just be the quiet observer, ask questions. Be interested in who other people are. What they do for a living. Where they’ve lived. Listen out for unusual experiences, and ask for elaboration.

When you click with certain members, exchange numbers. The point here is to be proactive in widening your circle of real life friends.

Because as the old saying goes, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”

Meetup and grow rich,

Alexis Dawes

I was giving a consultation to a DBO reader a couple of days.

And the reader begins to tell me about an unprofitable site that he’d been running.

While he was barely making peanuts, another seller in the same niche was making some insane amount of money. Insane like over $10,000, but under $50,000 a month. (And no… it’s not internet marketing related.)

So said reader surveyed his newsletter subscribers (40-70 year old women) to find out why they weren’t buying from him.

“We don’t have any money!” they exclaimed.

“I’m on social security – fixed income…” said one reader.

“My husband is ill, and I can barely afford to buy his medicine,” said another.

According to a survey he conducted, nobody could afford to buy from said reader.

And yet, a fellow competitor was raking in the cash. Hmmmm.

What did I tell said reader?

Well here’s my experience.

I’ve sold information to readers who were in some pretty horrible financial situations.

Sick husbands… lost jobs… bankruptcy… fixed incomes… hospital bills… car repo’s… I’ve heard it all.

Yeah, the EXACT same excuses that my reader heard from his subscribers.

Only thing is, I hear those excuses AFTER they purchase from me.

I’m talking about people who had to borrow a friend or family members credit card or PayPal account, or wait 2 weeks to mail me a money order. No BS dire financial straights.

And it was during that experience I discovered that every niche has the potential to be profitable.

Sure, there are some poor older women out there. There are poor folks everywhere. I was poor for a long time.

But let’s look at the flip side.

There’s this great big retirement community in Florida for active older adults called The Villages. Think of it as a Disneyworld for seniors.

According to 2000 cenus info, the median age at The Villages is 66.3. The median household income, $42,542. 52.4% of the residents are women.

These silver foxes have tricked out golf carts – (think MTV’s “Pimp My Ride” meets golf cart granny). They’ve got big ass custom homes, with specially designed driveways. Two luxury cars in the garage. Landscaping that rivals the front of any luxury hotel. And there are like 20 banks in the community alone. Banks don’t come a runnin’ unless there’s gold in the hills.

If you’re not making any money it’s because YOU haven’t hit upon the sweet spot yet, not because people don’t have money.

People say they don’t have any money because (A) it’s a convenient excuse, or (B) they don’t want what you’re selling. For the most part.

Sometimes people really are extremely broke. And sometimes they’ll be subscribers to your newsletter or readers of your blog.

But what are the odds that every broke person on earth ends up visiting your site? If you said “very slim,” then you see my point.

If the customer isn’t nibbling, maybe it’s because you’re selling a product that they have already. Or your copy is dull. Or your product is dull. Maybe your site design is ugly.

Maybe your information is too generic. I mean just because it’s new and interesting to you doesn’t mean it’s new to the people who you want to buy from you.

Either way, it’s not them. It’s you.

Rework your plan and grow rich,

Alexis Dawes