Customer Reviews

Ready, Fire, Aim: Zero to $100 Million in No Time Flat (Agora Series)

5 star:		(55)
4 star:		(11)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

I enjoy the occasional book on marketing and how to acheive success. The cover blurbs for "Ready, Aim, Fire" seemed promising as did some of the Amazon reviews. So I figured why not.

I can now answer the question "why not" in detail and at length.

First, the good news. Michael Masterson does a reasonably good job of distilling the advice offered in dozens of other books on advertising and marketing, from Napoleon Hill to Rosse Reeve's "Reality In Advertising". However, the solid advice gleaned from those classics is diluted with Masterson's endless preening and outright bragging.

The overall experience is not necessarily enjoyable or instructive, unless you are inspired by someone telling you, over and over and over again, of how successful and great he is.

A careful reading led me to become very suspicious of Michael Masterson and to do some quick research. Masterson claims to have had titles on the New York Times, Wall St. Journal and Amazon best seller lists. Indeed, on two occasions - and that means two distinct dates - Masterson was on the Wall St. Journal best seller list. This is not like being on that list week after week: it was twice for one time each. As for the New York Times, a Nexis search shows Michael Masterson appearing in the Times just once, with a comment in an article. No appearances on their best seller list. Amazon's best seller lists are very different and appearing on them is on meaningless. It is said that having 30 friends order a book at the same time will put you on their best sellers list for a little while at least.

More disturbing are Masterson's associations, one of which is Agora International, which publishes a number of investment newsletters which seem to be of the "we have a tip for you" variety. Agora was sued for fraud by the SEC at one point. This does not reflect directly on Masterson since he claims a nebulous role of "consultant" with them. It does, however, reflect on the company he keeps.

The company he keeps also includes AWAI, American Artists & Writers, Inc. Masterson doesn't say that he authored a product for them, a course on copywriting. Both AWAI and Masterson are the subject of literally hundreds of online complaints.

As I said, much of this book is borrowed and adapted. I don't have a problem with that since solid knowledge is intended to be passed on, as long as it is not plagarized in violation of copyright laws. But even here, Masterson leaves himself open to question. He attributes the concept of the "unique selling proposition" to a 1980 book called "Positioning". In fact, Rosser Reeves first put forth the expression and the concept in his 1961 "Reality In Advertising".

Would I recommend that someone read this book? Sort of. It is an adequate distillation of marketing advice from many reputable sources. To his credit, Masterson doesn't claim to be the original thinking here. On the other hand, Masterson's personal credibility is questionable and you really have to take what he says of his own success with a very large grain of salt. Personally I think there are better books in this area to be found.

Jerry

"Nothing matters more than selling," says the author. "Many first-time entrepreneurs have the impression that they are doing things in a logical order when they look for the perfect office space, have logos designed, and order a lot of inventory. The reality is they are wasting valuable resources on secondary and tertiary endeavors. If no one is going to buy what you want to sell, you've just wasted a bunch of money on a business that will never be."

I see this when a client comes to me and has spent most of his small budget on Web site design and left the important thing, the sales message, for least --- just to fill in the beautiful design. They've spent their money on the least important and have no money left for the most important. This book addresses just these issues.

In this new book Masterson gives a three-step process that entrepreneurs should follow in order to have a successful business. Unfortunately, most do not. I've seen this first hand in my own consulting business. Entrepreneurs tend to put their values and their money on all the wrong things --- and this leads to certain failure.

Here are the steps according to Masterson:

Step one: Get the product ready enough to sell, but don't worry about perfecting it. Step two: Sell it. Step three: If it sells, make it better. While this all sounds fairly easy, it's not.

"Selling can be terrifying," Masterson says. "It can be tough, gritty, unglamorous work. But when you make that first big sale, you realize it's also exhilarating. And like it or not, you probably won't become a successful entrepreneur until you can sell your product or service in your sleep."

When your business is new, you should begin to build a base of customers or clients --- that means you have to sell. Online, that would mean you have to have a powerful sales message on your Web site and in all of your online advertising.

Successful entrepreneurs should (and generally do) spend most of their time --- especially in the beginning --- on selling. Most are very bad at it.

"As the business grows out of its infancy--as it goes beyond the million-dollar revenue mark by selling many more products through many more channels--you can let other people do most of the selling," says the author.

"But by establishing your marketing credentials during the first stage, when the selling secrets of your business are still unknown, you will gain a deep understanding of your business that will serve you well for the rest of your career."

The author writes in an engaging style. This material should help those starting their own business and even those already in business. I see so many mistakes that entrepreneurs make and they tend to be the same things all the time.

If you can avoid those mistakes, you can quickly leap over everyone else and become successful.

I believe some of the advice is fairly good. However is you own a very very small business like I do it doesn't help me. If you check out the 5 star reviews they are from people that help promote his company. You scrath my back I'll scratch yours. Unfortunately, I should have checked them out before I bought the book. Not After! Don't buy it.

This could have easily been just a 10 to 20 page report. If that long.

I never understand why supposedly successful people have to write books that spend so much time plugging themselves, their businesses and friends.
If the information was that great people would gladly contact people or businesses on a resource page.

The positive reviews have to be paid reviews. This book is, by far, the biggest joke of a "business" book I have ever read.

You can sum up this book in one short sentence - market yourself.

The rest are unsubstantiated boasts, or self-promotions. Google the author's name, and exercise some healthy skepticism.

If you want a savvy business advice, here is one - skip this trash, and save yourself some time.

Exaggerations can make a point. Simplification can speed things up and to run a 100 million dollar company there is going to be.... The problem with the this current crop of marketing book authors is that they are so busy with self-promotion that they don't think the marketplace, you and I, the customers are worth treating with respect.

Mr. Masterson has maybe done what he claims but this book is only telling us the good part of his story. If you read some of the on-line forums that comment on his business, you get a much different picture. And the most favorable reviews here on Amazon are written by his cohorts.

There is very useful information in here but it was hard for me to get past his ego and the very ego driven delivery of it all.

I did like his break down of the 4 different levels from infancy to beyond 100 million dollars. But only a copywriter like Masterson puts a title on his book that says you could do it "in no-time-flat." Really, Mike?

Proceed with caution my fellow marketers and entrepreneurs, he has good information tucked in this book but keep a snorkel close while reading. It gets deep after the drop-off.

After reading all the positive reviews I begin to wonder if I was being setup. Nothing new in this book. The author brags endlessly about his career and how rich he is, but rich people don't have to brag. I suspect this book is being hyped by it's own publisher. It is way overrated and is written like a sales book for dummies. That said, it did reinforce some good ideas and it was not a complete waste of time.

I've read well over a dozen business books in just the past few months (Made to Stick, We are Smarter than Me, etc) and this is right up there with the best. Maybe THE best.

It's much less about the latest hot new trends (social media, web 2.0 etc) and much more about getting back to a basic truth about business. It is a truth that seems obvious and even boring but yet you hardly ever hear it.

What he's talking about is that success in business is quite simply about selling. Not endless planning, not org charts and flow charts and meetings and stationary, but simply getting a sale made. Do that and everything else takes care of itself. The other key point is the interesting twist to Jack Welch's "Speed" manta which Masterson calls "accelerated failure". (Thus the Ready Fire Aim title). The idea here is that you only learn the secrets of a business through mistakes - and the faster you make them (and of course learn from them and change your strategy) the better off you're going to be.

All kinds of very unique and interesting ideas in here. It's got a lot of things I've not heard elsewhere that make a lot of sense.

I only wish I'd read this about 15 years ago, I'd probably be retired by now.

This is a book read and follow. This book leads by example. It talks about planning, organization, follow through, selling. Follow the plan and methodology covered in this book It talks about selling yourself, Selling your product, building confidence in your organization,having a product to sell, building a solid customer base and building a solid business foundation. Offering customer service value.

It's an easy read and keeps the reader interested through-out. This book is very well written and laid out. The plans discussed are practical and easy to follow. Do the right things build a solid foundation and sell. Don't think to big too quickly. Stay with in your plan. It's not about building huge organizations in record time it about building a solid business plan and selling. Selling yourself and selling your business. Develop a plan and follow it. Make sure that you also have a viable plan B and C.


The book also has some personal growth aspects to it that are great. The suthor discusses the ability to have versatility to adapt to different situations and thrive in them.

Read this book and re read it. Think about the concepts laid out in this book and tink about what you will need to do to follow them.

The book talks about building a business suited to you. How to take advantage of your own personality traits and put them into action in a financially rewarding way.

This is the best book about selling that I have read in a very long time.

Kudos to Michael Masterson. This is the first book I have read of his but it won't be the last. It's easy to see why so many have followed his advice.

This is a five star book for anyone at any financial level. Well worth the 20 or so dollars that this book sells for a million times over. SELL, SELL, SELL. Live eat and breathe selling.

I literally have 100s of books in my library on business - but I always
make room for somebody who has actually "done it" and not talked about it.
Michael is definitely that first kind.

Whether you are bright-eyed beginner looking to get your first business
up or you're a 7-figure earner or even a serial entrepreneur - you'll
find breakthrough ideas in here.

Personally, there have been things in here that have totally eluded me
like an org chart that actually makes sense for an entrepreneur and not a
corporate giant. I'm really excited to use this as part of my blueprint
to grow my new ventures to the next levels!