Monthly Archives: May 2020

The Importance of Diversification

The Importance of Diversification

The Importance of Diversification

Yesterday, I had a sobering telephone conversation with a prospect I called from my day job as an outside-sales-turned-inside-sales print consultant. That’s when I truly learned the importance of diversification.

He’s in the tourism industry. I recently started calling people in the tourism industry, offering them polycarbonate barriers and social distancing signage/supplies as they slowly reopen for business. This man was kind and gentle, but his view of the future was grim. He said, “Everyone is talking about how Alberta needs to diversify and stop focusing so much on oil and gas, which is true. But nobody in Banff realized the importance of diversification for us—becoming more than just a tourism town—until the day came when we had to lay off 85% of our workforce.”

One town. 85% of its workforce shut down due to this pandemic.

The Importance of Diversification

I’m one of the lucky ones. I remain the same workaholic I’ve been for the past several years—working seven days per week at full-time and part-time jobs while running my book publishing company. I’ve never been more grateful to have the continued privilege to work this hard.

Why do I have all these jobs? Well, as those closest to me are aware, I took around risk three years ago. I knowingly, purposefully went to the edge of the proverbial cliff. But before I could jump or fly or do anything of the sort, that cliff crumbled out from under me. I’ve been climbing back up ever since. My choice. I own it. Zero regrets about it. Learned a lot. Life goes on.

That fall forced me to find two jobs to supplement my book publishing business. Ever since then, I’ve worked weekends at London Drugs. And I work weekdays at Mountain View Printing. I’m fully diversified with these two “offline” jobs and my “online” book publishing work. So, I feel safer than most people feel right now. But that wasn’t always the case.

Forced Shut-Down

I remember the first day, back in March, when we were all told to stay home by our government. I felt shell-shocked. As a salesperson who is accustomed to driving all over the city, cold calling, and meeting in person with clients, I sat there with my phone in my hand, wondering how in the hell to make myself relevant. I can’t deliver anything. I can’t meet with anyone. And it’s socially unacceptable to try to sell anything right now. What am I supposed to do here? I felt scared.

I was unsure what to do, so I just started calling and emailing my clients to say, “Hey, I hope you’re okay. There’s another human being on the other side of this call who is going through this with you. I’m here if you want to talk.” The first day I did that, I received six replies saying, “THANK YOU. I NEEDED THAT.” That’s when I knew I was on the right track.

I’ve made anywhere from 35 to 50 phone calls and emails per day, every single day, since then. Thank God I have employers who immediately saw the value in that—and continue to see the value in me, my character, and my loyalty to both them and my customers. The owners of Mountain View Printing have had stresses of their own to deal with, but they’ve continued to show such patience with their staff. I have so much respect for them and appreciate that they’ve allowed me to blow off steam by sharing in the occasional social media comment/discussion in between calls. That’s how I manage stress; I exercise my brain by thinking out loud and debating with people.

We All Handle Stress Differently

My other job, at London Drugs, has taught me some interesting things about human nature. If you would have told me, three months ago, that I would one day be thanked and called a hero for showing up to work to ring through people’s toilet paper purchases, I would have laughed and called you nuts. But I get thanked and called a hero at least three times per weekend now. It’s downright bizarre.

What’s even more bizarre is all the different ways that people are handling this forced shut-down. I’ve seen people wearing full-on helmets with plastic facemasks standing two meters away from someone in flip flops and shorts. Some wear gloves. Others don’t. Some people are terrified. Others think the whole thing is ridiculous. Every single one of them thanks me for being there for them—which is laughable considering that, just three months ago, many of them were downright rude to retail people. They saw us as somehow below them. Now we’re all gods and goddesses to them. It’s so bizarre.

To those of you who have felt afraid for your health, I have compassion for you. I also ask that you have compassion for the people around you in these stores. Some of you have yelled at other people for not standing far enough away from you. You’ve criticized the clerks in front of you for not wearing masks, or not changing their gloves after every damn order, et cetera. STOP! Please understand that some of the people who are working there are just as afraid as you are, but they must be there. They don’t have a choice because that job is their only livelihood. You, on the other hand, have a choice. You don’t have to be there. So, if you’re that bothered by what you see around you, please leave.

London Drugs is a phenomenal employer and retailer that has been so patient with both staff and customers during this entire time. This company does its best to accommodate everyone while respecting the protocols the government has set forth for everyone.

Respecting Government Protocols

As for me, I have also done my best to respect these protocols … even though I have questioned most of them right from day one, and still do. I personally agree with Sweden’s handling of this coronavirus. Still, for the past three months, I’ve done nothing but go to work, come home, work from home, go to work, come home, work from home. I buy as many of my groceries from London Drugs as I can to avoid going into the large grocery stores too often. I wear gloves when I’m serving customers, and I spray hand sanitizer on those gloves quite often each hour. I don’t wear a mask. We couldn’t get them for such a long time that we learned how to manage at London Drugs without them. We have those polycarbonate barriers up between us and customers, anyway, so I hope that makes people feel safer.

What I’ve truly learned from this whole pandemic is the importance of diversification. Thank God I’m fully diversified in all that I do. I wear many hats—both online and offline—so I’ll always have work. I never realized just how lucky I am until I talked to that gentleman in Banff yesterday. He’s genuinely frightened for his family’s future.

You might consider syndicating this content on your own blog. If you do, make sure to attribute the original source so neither of us gets dinged on the SEO front. You can do that by including this line at the bottom of the article: This content first appeared on the PPG Publisher’s Blog and has been republished here with permission.
As a user of this website, you are authorized only to view, copy, print, and distribute the documents on this website so long as: one (1) the document is used for informational purposes only; and two (2) any copy of the document (or portion thereof) includes the following copyright notice: Copyright © 2020 Polished Publishing Group (PPG). All rights reserved.




How do I get paid online?

I love all the questions that are being emailed to me by new subscribers, lately. Thank you. One recent question that I want to answer this evening is, “How do I get paid online?” Well, it all depends on which ecommerce site you’re selling digital content through. They are all free of charge to set up. But some companies will send payments directly to your bank account while others will pay you through PayPal.

How do I get paid online by Amazon, Kobo, and Ingram?

How do I get paid online for personal book sales?

You can see, in the above picture, that my books sell through various Amazon sites: Canada, USA, Germany, India, Australia, et cetera. You can also see that Amazon collects payments from each country in that country’s currency. Three months later, it converts that currency into Canadian dollars before depositing it directly into my Canadian bank account. The all happens automatically each month. I don’t have to do anything. I just get paid whenever books sell.

In the free book I give you when you subscribe to this blog, I explain which website link you can visit to set up your Amazon account and start publishing books. When you set up that account, you will also be directed to provide your bank account information to Amazon. It’s quite easy and safe to do, and Amazon gives easy instructions to follow. Then, from that point forward, you’ll get paid for your books wherever they sell throughout the world. Best of all, Amazon will pay you in your country’s currency.

Kobo and Ingram Content Group pay me the exact same way as Amazon pays me. I provided bank account information to each of them when I set up my publishing accounts. And now? They automatically pay me royalties based on however many book sales I make in all the countries they sell in around the world.

How do I get paid online as an affiliate marketer?

Book royalties are only part of the income I earn online. In addition to selling ebooks through Amazon and Kobo, and paperback books through Ingram, I also sell online courses through Udemy. I sell my own personally-designed course titled Self-Publishing Success in Bookstores and Online!, and I earn affiliate income by selling other people’s courses through my website.

How do I get paid online for affiliate marketing?

Udemy, and many other affiliate marketing sites, offer you the option of being paid via PayPal rather than through your regular bank account. This makes account set-up a lot faster if you already have a PayPal account. If you don’t have a PayPal account yet, then you can set one up for free. It will take a few days to establish the account before you can start using it.

Click on this link to view our online course selections related to affiliate marketing: Earn Additional Passive Online Income as an Affiliate Marketer

I have a business PayPal account that is attached to my business bank account and credit card. When I get paid affiliate marketing commissions, I can keep that money in my PayPal account. Or, if I choose, I can transfer it to my regular bank account.

Much like Amazon, PayPal will figure out currency conversion for you. This makes it easy to buy and sell all around the world. How wonderful is that?

How do I get paid online for monetizing my blog?

You may have noticed that, at the bottom of every webpage and blog post on this website, there is an advertisement that looks something like this:

Google AdSense advertisements

Google AdSense advertisements

That’s a Google AdSense advertisement. In this mini ebook, I talk about how you can direct more traffic to your website using pay-per-click (PPC) advertising. Better yet, you can earn money on your website through other people’s PPC ads by setting up a Google Adsense account for yourself.

How does this work? Well, the above ad was paid by someone else and placed on my website by Google. Whenever someone visits my website and clicks on any of these ads, I earn a small portion of the money that advertiser paid to place it there; it is paid to me by Google like a form of commission off the sale.

Google Adsense is another easy way to monetize a website and get paid online. Google pays me directly to my bank account like Amazon does. There is no PayPal option here.

So Many Ways to Get Paid Online

You can set up so many different income streams for yourself online. Once they are set up and attached to either your bank account or your PayPal account, then all you must do is drive traffic to the website(s) where you sell books and whatever else. Promote these things online then watch them sell. That’s all you have to do. And the payments will take care of themselves for you just as they now do for me.

You might consider syndicating this content on your own blog. If you do, make sure to attribute the original source so neither of us gets dinged on the SEO front. You can do that by including this line at the bottom of the article: This content first appeared on the PPG Publisher’s Blog and has been republished here with permission.
As a user of this website, you are authorized only to view, copy, print, and distribute the documents on this website so long as: one (1) the document is used for informational purposes only; and two (2) any copy of the document (or portion thereof) includes the following copyright notice: Copyright © 2020 Polished Publishing Group (PPG). All rights reserved.