How to “Think” of Me:
Who is Chris Wechner?
It always helps people remember someone when they know when
they “should” think of them.
During different times of my life, I’ve been “The (Blank)
Guy.”
When I was a kid, I was The SOCCER Guy.
In college, I was The MATH Guy…sometimes The Math Professor
Guy.
During the early part of my career, I was The QUALITY CONTROL Guy.
During the majority of my last jobs, I was The EXCEL Guy (or
occasionally, The Access Guy).
Today, most people know me as The MARKETING Guy.
So…Who were these “other
guys?”
Honestly, I have received very little formal education in
Marketing.
When I was a kid, I was interested in the idea, but I don’t
think I really understood what marketing really was.
At the time, I thought that it was simply “being creative”
and finding ways to get people to buy what I…or you…have to offer.
That’s pretty good, but there is a whole lot more to
marketing than just “being creative.”
The Math Guy
During college, I became a math major, mostly for the wrong
reasons. I was good at it, and most of
the time, I enjoyed it. However, I never
really knew how I would apply it to my life once I graduated.
I completely immersed myself in it. Well, I immersed myself in the teaching side
of it. I really loved to help people
understand something that seems difficult for them. I’ve always loved that feeling of being able
to make the seemingly difficult…into something that’s pretty easy.
So I tutored for Western Michigan University, where I went
to college. I tutored the low and higher
levels of college entry level math.
Certainly, I tutored independently, too, as that paid more, but I was
mostly focused on finding ways to make things easier for people to understand.
…and I did it with enthusiasm. I can’t think of a time when I went to work
as a math tutor when I didn’t enjoy what I was doing.
Don’t get me wrong! I
was more enthusiastic to help some people more than others, but I always
enjoyed my craft. If the other person
was not interested in learning, he or she usually didn’t stay for very long…not
long enough to dampen my enthusiasm for helping people.
The Quality Control
Guy
After college, I picked up a job as a Quality Technician for
an extrusion plastics company (that’s no longer in business today). Honestly, I had NO idea what a Quality
Technician did. I just knew that my
college buddy who graduated with a degree in statistics had a job at the same
company doing the same thing. So it made
sense for me, too, right?
Well, I had NO clue, and I didn’t have a clue for the better
part of my first year of working there.
Eventually, I started to find my stride and began to develop a liking
for it.
I enjoyed reviewing the data, but I really enjoyed analyzing
what was really important to our customers.
On part print drawings, there are lots of dimensions, and we were not
making precision parts. So technically,
I could reject nearly any part my company produced.
I was smart enough to know that rejecting EVERYTHING my
company made would result in us losing our jobs (since the company would not be
able to survive). More importantly, I
learned that only SOME of the things that were different from the print really
mattered to our customer.
My goal was to find what the “real” concerns were and teach
my coworkers. Then we could figure—together—what
we had to reject and what we could send to the customer.
As my Quality Control career progressed, my responsibilities
increased, but my basic goal was always the same. Analyze what really mattered to the customer…and
figure ways to measure to ensure THAT is what the customer got.
The Excel Guy
Actually, I was really a data guy, but most people saw my
work with MS Excel and associated me with that.
I used programs like MS Excel and MS Access to create data
structures and analyze the data I collected.
During my time as The Quality Control Guy, I would record
our part measurements, internal part rejections, customer complaints, and customer
return costs.
I would also use Excel to create forms. People usually liked the way my forms looked.
Later in my career, I started doing other odd jobs, like medical
underwriting (low level), purchasing data transfer, tool move case tracking,
etc.
At my last “real” job, I was working for a company that was
not in good shape, and that industry was ailing…badly. It lasted longer than I thought, but I could
see that my job skills were becoming rapidly outdated.
So when I learned about an internet marketing class, I
figured that anything having to do with computers would be good for me to learn. However, there was a funny thing about that
course.
I only paid attention to the Internet part…but NO attention
to the marketing part, but that changed quickly.
What makes me The
Marketing Guy Today?
Even though I started taking that class to get better
computer skills, I started to remember that I liked marketing.
Internet marketing is each exciting…and boring.
At first, it was also really confusing. It was not brand new, but internet marketing
was new enough that the people who were teaching it were not necessarily great
teachers.
So it took me a while before I had any clue about what I was
doing with it.
I started volunteering to work for a small real estate
investing business. At first, neither
the owner nor I had any idea how I would help, but he was smart enough to take
advantage of free work, especially work from someone who was serious about
learning.
Soon I realized that the owner was overwhelmed with too much
work. One of the things I saw him do was
marketing online. However, he really did
not have time to do it.
So I offered to take over that for him. This way, he could focus on other parts of his
business.
There were other people working with him as partners, but
they really did not know much about marketing.
He did, but he really didn’t have enough time to devote to that part of
his business.
HERE WAS A PERFECT OPPORTUNITY FOR ME!
I started doing all sorts of things. Today, I see that I was doing many things “wrong.” However, eventually, people were finding
things I made online for this owner.
I took another class to learn how to market online. So I started to learn even more. Plus, I bought a couple online courses. I also started meeting with peers to figure
out this “internet marketing stuff.”
My work captured the attention of someone locally who was
pretty well known for being The Internet Guy, himself. He looked at how much work I did, and he
walked away impressed.
He made a deal with me.
He would show me how to do several things online…IF…I would be willing
to help students in a workshop he was teaching.
I did what he taught me.
I practiced many times to make sure I truly understood it. Finally, when the class came, I
enthusiastically helped as many students as I could. The workshop was a huge success!
I worked on another project with this “Internet Guy” on a
volunteer basis. So I picked up another
internet marketing technique.
I started volunteering for a few different businesses. It’s amazing what you can learn when you are
not afraid to make mistakes. (When you’re
volunteering, getting fired is not a very big threat.)
I started making money using my internet marketing
techniques. Only some of those
techniques work today, but the first time you make money online, it’s amazing
how exciting that is.
I managed to influence someone I never met…and probably
never will meet.
For the last couple of years, I started giving talks about
internet marketing. THIS is when many
people started to know me as The Marketing Guy.
Truth be told, marketing is too huge to “do everything.” However, as long as you know who you really
can help, you can be a marketing specialist…and be a darn good one and really
help companies make money.
So what type of marketing
do I do?
As I write this, the majority of my marketing falls into a
few categories:
Craigslist Marketing
Online Reputation Development (making your small company
seem larger than it might be)
Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for Emergency Service
Companies
SEO for Real Estate
Twitter (for Branding only)
Twitter (for Branding only)
What separates me
from most other marketers?
I am not the most technical guy. Sure, I have some technical skills, but there
are many people who are WAY better than me with their technical skill set.
Just like when I was The Quality Control Guy, I am an EXPERT
at identifying what really matters…and things that don’t matter so much.
I can write…In fact, I write really well.
Actually, I am not a writer.
I am an analyst. I notice things
that make the world seem less complicated, and I find ways to transfer what I
notice…into words that allow you do understand what I noticed.
If you understand what I see and see how I saw it, you have
a much better chance of benefiting from it.
Hence, I decided to form a company called…The Ultimate
Analyst.
I’m an analyst first…and a teacher second. Writing is just one of the ways I make sure
you understand something that’s important to you…even if you don’t know how
important it is…yet.
Most marketers seem to be one of a few things:
Technical
Analytical
Creative
I am creatively analytical, and I love using it to find ways
to help you. I’m just wired that
way. Sometimes, my business even
benefits from it. (However, personally I
always do!)