What Batman Taught Me About Internet Marketing

Batman has always been my favorite superhero. Don’t get me wrong…Spiderman and Superman are cool and all, but they pale in comparison to the ultimate crime-fighter…Batman.

photo credit: Hot Rod Homepage

Do you know why I love Batman?

Because he’s just like you and me. Sure he’s got lots of money and cool gadgets…but underneath the mask he’s just a guy. He can’t fly. He can’t see through walls. He can’t shoot spiderwebs from his wrists…

He’s just a complete bad-ass who succeeds through the sheer force of his will. You can’t help but admire him.

Batman displays a lot of qualities that internet marketers like you and me can learn from. Below I’ve listed 3 that I find particularly important.

An incredible work ethic. Batman/Bruce Wayne busts his butt day in and day out to achieve his goal. He trains himself and hones his skills until he is the absolute best at what he does. And he never takes a night off. He’s consistent and reliable.

This is an important lesson for you to learn. Many internet marketing strategies can be easy to maintain, but it does take some work to get them rolling. You’ll achieve your goals a lot faster if you take your work seriously and treat it like a business. Put time in every day in the beginning and you’ll soon see the results you’re looking for.

Discipline. Batman’s self-discipline is legendary. Not only does he take a physical beating without giving in but the emotional toll of living two lives must be just as brutal. And he always stays focused on the task at hand. To Batman…being distracted for an instant could mean death.

Focus and discipline are absolutely essential for any online business owner. Time and time again I see bright entrepreneurs undone by their inability to stay focused. They jump around from one “system” or “method” to the next. They become a jack of all trades..but a master of none.

There are 8 billion different ways to make money online. Pick one and go with it. Once you master it and are producing steady income you can look to diversify and open new streams of income. But if you are constantly distracted by the latest “sure-thing” then as Seven of Nine would say…

You will fail…

You must stay focused. Constantly ask yourself “Is this moving me toward my goal?” If the answer is no then stop and get yourself back on track.

Perseverance. Batman knows all about failure and pain. As a child he saw his parents murdered right in front of him. As Bruce Wayne he is forced to keep everyone at a distance. As Batman he regularly takes crow bars to his rib cage and sees criminals like the Joker escape his clutches. Yet he never, ever gives up. No matter how many setbacks he faces, he always come back stronger.

In the 2005 movie Batman Begins, there’s a line that is repeated several times to Bruce Wayne:

“Why do we fall? So we can learn to pick ourselves up.”

As a fellow entrepreneur, let me tell you right now that failure is part of the game. Get used to it. The idea of being an overnight success story is a myth.

The person interested in success has to learn to view failure as a healthy, inevitable part of the process of getting to the top.
Dr. Joyce Brothers

I failed many times before I really learned how to make money online. My first website was about wine, which is an insanely competitive keyword. I built a site of about 20 pages or so with the idea of monetizing it with AdSense units and affiliate links. It was a solid plan…but my execution was horrible.

I targeted all the wrong keywords. I knew little about SEO tactics. My promotion and link building was almost non-existent. In the end I was lucky if I brought in $10 a month in AdSense.

Next I tried building a simple site to promote Site Build It. I basically took their sales pages, made a few adjustments, and quickly wasted a few hundred dollars using AdWords. The product was great but I had no clue how to run a successful PPC campaign and my sales copy flat out sucked.

My next project was a 10 page site about mesothelioma. I had read an article about keywords that earned between $50 and $100 per click from Adsense and jumped at the chance to make big money. But I never had a chance. Mesothelioma is an incredibly competitive niche and it would take a lot more work than slapping together a few crappy pages.

Next I decided to create my own ebook and sell it on Clickbank. It was a short but full of useful tips for saving money on just about everything. Unfortunately I knew almost nothing about copywriting and I positioned the ebook poorly. I targeted the wrong market and never recovered.

I sold exactly one copy.

But I learned from my mistakes and converted that site from a one page sales letter into a portal for people trying to save money or make extra money from home. I still earn AdSense and affiliate commissions from that site even though I haven’t really updated it in over 2 years.

I don’t fear failure anymore and neither should you. Failure is how we learn what works and what doesn’t. If you try something and it doesn’t work out as planned, don’t just give up. Analyze what went wrong, learn from your mistakes, and try again.

It’s what Batman would do.