The Niche Affiliate Marketing Workshop was an incredible experience. This was the 2nd “NAMS” event and it took place in Atlanta this past weekend, August 14-17.
The goal of this workshop is to teach Affiliate Marketing and specific marketing strategies in a hands-on workshop format, with a chance for everyone to complete tasks and see results.
It also gives you an opportunity to meet Affiliate Marketers that are doing this for a living, and talk with them one on one. There is a lot of open networking between instructors and attendees, which makes this a very unique event.
For me personally, it’s great to get that time to sit down with people – in person – and really help them get started with their own affiliate sites. I was able to share specific examples, marketing strategies that are working very well for me, and to brainstorm ideas on the micro-level.
I absolutely love teaching all of these things online through my forum, and through my weekly webinars, but spending the weekend working hands-on with everyone was absolutely incredible!
At NAMS, you don’t just learn how, you actually get to put it into practice. Chris Cobb was able to achieve a top 10 ranking on Google within 20 minutes, which was still holding strong the next day. A whole slew of content was written – from articles for Article Marketing to short reports to generate subscribers & income. And there were others there that made their very first affiliate sales over the weekend. It was very inspiring – and tons of fun.
We had a bit of a slow start on Friday, but it was a whole new set-up from the first NAMS Workshop and we were playing it by ear. Fortunately everyone was very open with their feedback, and all of the instructors pulled together and made necessary changes. Most of us completely re-wrote our presentations on the fly even, and went out of our way to make sure everyone got what they needed. The teamwork among the instructors was simply amazing.
I was really glad that everyone voiced their thoughts on Friday. We sat up late that evening discussing details and brainstorming solutions. To everyone that spoke to me personally, or that submitted the feedback form, thank you. It was that feedback that really brought things together, and had everyone super productive throughout the weekend – leaving with a big smile, looking forward to returning to the next NAMS Workshop in January. What a turn-around!
One of the things that I enjoyed most throughout the weekend, was all of the PROOF IN ACTION.
On Saturday I participated in a live recording where we discussed product creation. Our topic was “Create Your Own Product in 90 Minutes”, and our focus was on creating audio products. David Perdew led the session, and I got a seat on the panel alongside Cindy Dawson, Mark Hendricks and Jeff Herring. We didn’t know the topic until we were sitting on the panel, so there was absolutely no preparation on our part… and David recorded the session live. We literally created that product in under 90 minutes. Point made!
You can download the recording here.
During my presentation on Sunday afternoon, I shared specific strategies for leveraging your competition. I set the presentation up by allowing them to leverage me, and actually make affiliate sales while I was teaching.
I also really liked what Joe Marsh taught on getting to the front page of Google results – fast. And by the way, the keyword phrase that Chris Cobb used when she tried Joe’s method, was a competitive 2-word phrase with more than 5,000 searches per month. It was a solid strategy, and I think it really amazed everyone to see it in action when Chris applied it.
All of the instructors shared specific examples, showed exactly how it could be applied to various niches, and freely gave out ideas. What made it even more fun is that everyone there openly asked questions, got involved, and allowed us to help them even more by telling us exactly what they needed.
Of course, I can’t go without mentioning Michael Schultz, who we all called “Magic Myke” by the end of the weekend. Michael is only 16 years old, a total whiz kid – and was absolutely amazing as tech support throughout the workshop. Michael, thank you – I couldn’t have done my part without you, and you contributed so much to the event.
A special thanks to his super-cool mom Julie Anna as well, for trusting us with him for the weekend – you’re a gem! 
We really missed you at NAMS-2 and look forward to seeing you at the next workshop.
Michael has done a lot of work for me, including website design with matching business cards. For those of you that saw my card over the weekend, that was Michael’s work. You’ll find his site at http://www.sharppixeldesigns.com
Michael and Julie Anna are both Elite Members in my private brainstorming group. We are currently celebrating close to 3 years as a group. There are members on all skill levels, working in a wide variety of niches and business models, with a lot of products & profit coming out of the group. Amazing!
I also want to say a special thanks to Nicole Dean, Traci Knoppe, Suzanna Myers and the other Elite Members who volunteered their time & expertise during the workshop to help others get up to speed with their online business – thank you! 
There were a couple dozen Elite Members from my group at the NAMS Workshop, so we got a chance to hang out after hours and really get to know each other on a whole new level.
I held a private reception for them on Saturday night where we did a bit of brainstorming over cheesecake & chocolate. That was also when I made a fun special announcement that everyone seemed particularly happy about…
The picture below is a group of us that stayed over and had lunch together on Monday following the workshop. Let’s see if I can get this right just one more time (ha!) – Left to right you see me, Mary, Andrea, Mike, Adela, Sheila, Lisa, Glenn and Loretta.
All said and done, this was one event that was well worth attending. Everyone left with something of value, speakers and attendees alike, and I think we all had a fabulous time. I am already looking forward to the 3rd NAMS Workshop, and expect we’ll have even more success stories by then – and even more people joining in to start or grow their affiliate business.
Best,
p.s. The next NAMS Workshop will be held in Jan/Feb 2010, and you can secure your ticket at the early-bird rate if you register early. You’ll also have an opportunity to download the recording of the NAMS-2 event. There is a support link at the bottom of that page if you’d like to inquire about that.
We’d love to see you there!
@Kimmoy asks: What’s your opinion of NAMS vs Affiliate Summit?
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I’ll confess that it made for a long weekend for those presenting. It’s not easy to stay on top of your game non-stop for 3 straight days, including speaking and workshops and working lunches… but it was definitely worth it. 
