Reason #154 running a community is my #1 fave investment. AI Fatigue Don't ya think that the MORE AI there is... ...the MORE peeps will want to hang out with real peeps? The internet STARTED as Bulletin Boards, Usenet groups and forums. It's not a matter of WHEN an offer or product dies... And many products are dying FASTER with AI... But I ask? What will be even MORE VALUABLE? What will LAST another 20 to 100 years? People connecting with and helping people. Does that mean I think we shouldn't have AI products, services and software? Not at all... I'm saying... The product WILL die. To THRIVE long-term... We want to focus on PEOPLE. Agree? Disagree? Rooting For Ya, Travis

Here is the original post about this. I bought a $100 gift card from a local business and planned to auction it off as a way to get the attention of a local business I want to work with. Ran the auction from 7PM Aug 22 to 7PM Aug 23. https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19L7GiQsKX/ 14 bids from 9 different people... Aug 22 7:07p - $1 James 7:10p- $25 Lynne 7:16p - $30 Kim R 7:25p - $35 Dan 7:27p - $50 Lynne 7:40p - $55 Casey 8:05p - $60 Jess 8:05p - $60 Tracy 8:27p - $61 Mary 11:49P -$62 Casey Aug 23 10:20a - $65 Darra 11:15a - $75 Lynne 3:15p - $76 Casey 6:57p - $77 Lynne A change from my original plan is to take the winning amount and buy (in this case) a $77 gift card to another business....calling it "Auction It Forward". Sadly, there was no participation from the restaurant. Email and DMs have gone unanswered. If I happen to hear from them. I'll update. For this next auction, I will communicate with the business BEFORE I buy the gift card so I get participation.

Heard a great way to seperate the 2 on My First Million recently they said... They said if you held an event which way would the chairs face? Audience towards the front. Community towards each other. LOVE this. How do you define it?

I haven't seen this approach mentioned and would love some feedback, especially if you see a flaw I'm missing. If you sell to local businesses , web design, social media, SEO, etc. , one of the biggest challenges is simply getting the business owner's attention. They're buried with people trying to sell them the same things. I'm going to try a provide-value-first approach this week: 1. Buy a $100 gift card from a local business you'd like to work with. 2. Auction it on your business Facebook page or personal page, starting at $1, and tag the business so they can watch the auction happening. 3. Let's say it's a $100 gift card from a massage therapist. You get 29 bidders and the winning bid is $79. 4. The winner pays you $79 and gets the $100 gift card. Your cost to get the attention of that business owner was $21. ($100-$79) Let's say you now have 28 other people who have demonstrated that they're interested in buying what that business sells. So you approach the massage therapist: "29 people bid on the $100 gift card I auctioned. It sold for $79. Would you be willing to let the other bidders buy a $100 gift card from you for the same $79 winning price?" If she says yes, you send the losing bidders a link to purchase directly from the massage therapist for $79, with a deadline. The money goes directly to the massage therapist. You're out of the transaction. So instead of just cold calling the owner saying: "Can I help you get more customers?" You've spent $21, bought something from their business, created some social media attention for them, and potentially brought them several new customers before you've tried to sell them anything. Then you can ask: "Would you like me to do more of this?" That's the experiment I'm going to try. What am I missing? Where does this break? And how would you improve it? Thanks!

Hey what’s up guys. Excited to be in this community and creating the “I own the distribution” money (as far as I can tell, nothing else comes close) I have a few communities and assets that I own/control. I didn’t build any of them. I either bought them or got control from a “tired digital landlord”. I have a Facebook group of ≈11k local businesses A Facebook group of 32k small businesses in Florida (even though I don’t live there lol. humidity is my hell) An email list of 13k small business owners interested in marketing and growth And a Facebook group of 223k Dog owners. I’ve monetized them with different deals that I’ve negotiated (better pricing, bonuses, financing) like marketing services, software, funding, dog insurance, veterinary care, etc. Really excited to dive into the auction stuff and get connected with the folks here.