How I Made My First Sale Online (Pt. I)

It was January 2009, and I had just walked out of my final college class.

I was done. No more school. No more tests. No more studying.

I packed my bags, and drove four hours south, through Pennsylvania, and back into central Maryland to my parents house…the entire way wondering, “What’s next?”

I had no jobs lined up, and no good prospects.

On top of that, the stock market had just crashed, and we were in the thick of the Great Recession…so there weren’t many jobs to be had.

Which is how I wound up here…

On the left is my parent’s basement. This is where I was living, as a 22-year old recent college grad. On the right is the only job I could find after graduating…a paper shredding factory where I made $12 an hour.

I spent four years getting a degree in Business…and now I was making $12 an hour. Not how I imagined things.

But I had no other options, and not working wasn’t an option. Especially because of the big decision I made a few months prior.

Back in November 2008…I had flown down to Florida, where my girlfriend Aimee had been for the past 8 weeks training for her new job performing on a Royal Caribbean cruise ship.

We had been dating for 4 years, and she was about to go away for 8 months on this cruise ship…so I put together an elaborate plan to surprise her on the beach of Florida the night before she left, and ask her to marry me.

Luckily, she said yes.

But now the pressure was on. I had to find a way to start making some money or we would be in a tough spot after the wedding.

So the truth is…even though I was spending 8 hours a day covered in paper and dust, I was happy to have a job.

But I kept searching for something better…and a couple months later, I landed what I thought was my dream job.

In April, I got an offer from a huge consulting company which included a great salary, amazing benefits, a great office, my own desk and tons of other perks.

As a 22 year old, I was in heaven. It was more money than I had ever made by a long shot. And now, instead of walking into a dirty factory every day…I was walking into a gorgeous office…

But it didn’t take long for this dream job to become a nightmare.

I wasn’t enjoying my work. I didn’t like being bossed around with no input on anything. I didn’t like having someone else control my schedule. I hated waking up early. I hated sitting in traffic. I hated being bored and feeling like I wasn’t contributing to something worth working for. I’m sure you know the feeling.

So I did what most of us do. I started researching ways to start my own business…ways to make money on my own.

I remember it was July, and I was sitting in my parent’s living room on the family desktop.

I pulled up Google and searched “how to make money online”…and I found my first “guru.”

These two guys had a blog & a course where they taught people how to start their own blog and make money by selling digital information products and affiliate products.

My mind almost exploded. I felt like I had just been opened up to a whole new world I never knew existed…and I instantly got laser focussed on this new mission.

I spent the next 6 weeks locked in the basement working on this new business idea. It was a blog about my biggest passion in life, baseball.

I had played baseball my entire life. As a kid. In high school. And in college. So I figured that was a good niche to get into since I knew a lot about it.

I spent the next 8 months trying to build this new business, all while trying to get my marriage off on the right foot and working my full-time job.

I learned how to build websites, blogs, and social media followings. I learned what email marketing was and how to build a list. I learned how to (kind of) code in HTML. I learned how to launch a podcast. I learned how to install tracking pixels so I could track how much traffic my site was getting. I learned how to create ebooks and video courses. I learned how to setup a Facebook ad. And the list goes on and on.

My first website, TrainBaseball.com

My first ebook, The 10 Step Hitting System

But after 8 months of spending every free second I had on this website, I had absolutely zero sales to show for it.

I knew I was missing something. How on earth were all these other people making money online? I was doing all the same things they were, but no one was buying my products.

I was beyond frustrated, and I’m sure Aimee wasn’t thrilled either, especially since most of my free time was spent on this site.

So I went searching for some help.

In April of 2010…I started researching all the other competitors in the baseball market, and I kept running across this guy’s site. www.90mphclub.com

To be honest, I didn’t think there was any way he was successful because the site wasn’t very pretty…but I kept seeing it everywhere, which made me think I might be wrong.

Luckily, I ended up reaching out…

And that’s when me and Paul connected for the first time. He ended up inviting me up to New Jersey for a mastermind event he was hosting, and then again to Boston for a Red Sox game.

We talked baseball for most of the trip, but there was one conversation that completely change the entire trajectory of my life.

I started asking him on his website. I asked question after question. And eventually he let it slip that his website was making multiple millions of dollar each year.

I just about fell out of my chair. Half of me was angry that my site wasn’t working at all, and the other half was ecstatic to know that there’s a chance I could reach that level someday.

I asked him what the big difference between his site and mine was, and he pulled out his phone and loaded up a single page on his site and said, “Brian, this one landing page you’re looking at…this is the ONLY difference between you and me.”

I didn’t understand at first, but he started to explain how that one simple page was designed to convince people to buy his product.

And It wasn’t your standard landing page either. It was a systematic, formulaic page that followed a specific set of steps…in order…and it creates every new customer for him.

He called it his “sales page.”

I had never even heard that term, but I instantly knew I needed one.

He explained that when you’re trying to sell something to somebody…whether it’s a product, or a service, or anything at all…that you have to follow a specific recipe…in the right order…or you have no prayer of making the sales.

He started explaining the “recipe” to me…and I asked him why it works so well…

He explained that there are really only 10 main reasons why people don’t buy certain products. (He called them “sales objections”)

(I’ll reveal those 10 reasons in Part II. of this series)

…and he explained that most entrepreneurs have no idea these “objections” even exist, let alone how to address them…which is why most of us completely suck at selling.

He explained how his simple “recipe”…this little one simple page script practically eliminates all 10 of those “sales objections”…making it almost impossible for people to say “No” to whatever you’re selling.

2 hours later, I had his entire “recipe”…over 5 pages of notes written down in my notebook.

And I couldn’t wait to get home.

I knew I was on the brink of a breakthrough…and that all the work I put in was about to pay off.

I got home, stayed up all night creating this new page on my website…and did everything I could to make sure my visitors would see this new page…

…and the next afternoon, while I was on my lunch break at work, I got that email that we all hope for…

I had made my first sale!

It was one of the best feelings I had ever had. It was validation that I hadn’t wasted an entire year of my life. It was the encouragement I needed to keep moving forward toward this goal. And I’m sure it made my wife feel a little better about all the time and money I was spending on this website.

The “1 Page Blueprint”

Looking back, that one conversation with Paul…learning this one simple tactic…changed everything.

It gave me one simple skill that would help me sell over $30,000,000 worth of products online in a few short years.

And that’s why I’ve been working on an amazing resource that you’ll be able to get your hands on really soon.

I’ve been working simplify this “1 page blueprint” so that anyone, regardless of experience, can use it to sell their own products or services.

I’ve been imagining something you could have with you at all times…on your desk…in your backpack or laptop bag…something you can pull out anytime you need to create a “sales page” that convinces someone to buy something.

Here’s the original drawing I started working on a couple weeks ago…

The good news is, I just got back the rough draft from the designer yesterday, and I had the printers print me off a rough draft…and this thing turned out AMAZING!

It should be ready to ship out in the next day or two…so if you’re interested in getting your hands on this thing, click the button below and I’ll send you a message as soon as it’s ready!

(I’m going to give away the first 1,000 copies for free, so make sure to get on the ‘early bird’ list to get one of the free copies!)

P.S. Part II comes out in just a couple days, where I’ll be revealing the 10 Reasons People Aren’t Buying Your Product…and how you can instantly overcome all 10 to make it virtually impossible for them to say “No.”

…whether you’re selling a product, a service, or anything else…discovering how to eliminate people’s objections to buying from you is the key to succeeding online.

Keep an eye out for that post.

Additional menu

How I Made My First Sale Online (Pt. I)

The “1 Page Blueprint”