Market Leverage Christmas 14 Days Early?

This afternoon I got a pleasant surprise in the mail.  An early Christmas gift from Market Leverage?  Well, close but not exactly.  I got a package from them with my winning prizes from Tyler Cruz’s Affiliate Marketing Challenge 4 which finished up in October.

I placed 3rd place in that challenge with $2,646.00 in earnings for the month.  I was actually in 2nd place for a while there but another contestant ended up beating me last minute by just $27!  It’s all good though because the 2nd place prize was a speaker system which I didn’t really want anyways since I already have a nice set at home.

I took some pictures of all the stuff they sent me.  The first thing I got was a blue “I’m blogging this.” t-shirt which I really like.  I actually have a white version of this t-shirt as well from Blog World Expo so now I have both versions.  It’s a bit cold out right now to be wearing t-shirts, but in the summertime I am totally going to wear this. 

Now that I’m not working in the corporate world anymore I’m done with shirts and ties and dress pants.  I’m going to totally geek out and wear t-shirts like this in the summer again, just because it’s fun.

I think Market Leverage is pretty smart with these T-shirts.  Bloggers like them, and they give them a lot of free publicity every time they wear them.  Granted most people in the general public have no idea who Market Leverage is so if they see you out there wearing this they aren’t going to necessarily understand what the brand is, but when Bloggers meet up or attend conferences, you always see them wearing T-shirts from different companies.

The other thing they sent me was this waterproof, flexible keyboard that lights up when hooked up to your USB port.  It’s actually a full sized keyboard too which is nice.  I’m not totally sure yet what I’m going to do with this keyboard yet, but it will probably come in handy when I’m traveling with my small laptop that doesn’t have a full sized keyboard.  I’ll have to actually try it out to see how much I like typing on the keys.

This kind of keyboard could really come in handy when you’ve got kids that like to spill stuff all the time.

The third thing they sent me which is the actual prize I won in the competition is an Apple iTouch MP3 player with a $25 iTunes gift card!  They really went above and beyond on the prizes and it’s definitely appreciated.

Every time I get stuff like this in the mail, I totally laugh at myself at how excited I get when I get free stuff.  It’s funny because I could just as easily walk into a store and buy any of this stuff, but there’s just something about getting free stuff that’s very addicting.  It’s even more fun when you get free stuff by winning in a competition.

Why I Blog About This

The other week I had a conversation with another Blogger and I was talking about the different ways in which we can provide value to our readers.  One of the primary ways in which I like to provide value to my readers is by creating valuable, timeless content which they can use to improve the quality of their lives.  That has especially been the value I’ve focused on most with my InspiredMoneyMaker.com Blog.

However, after doing some thinking about my own experiences as a Blog reader I found that I also get a lot of value from Bloggers who don’t just teach me “How To” do things, but also inspire me with a strong enough WHY .  Meaning, I have found that some of the Blogs that I read may not necessarily be providing me with the best “how to” content, but they are definitely inspirational, and if they inspire me with a strong enough WHY then I’ll figure out the “how to” somehow anyways.

For example, I have always found Tyler Cruz’s Blog and John Chow’s Blog very inspirational.  Reading about their “Dot Com Lifestyle” inspired me to get my ass in gear and to learn how to make money online as well.  Some people think that Bloggers who write posts about stuff like this are just bragging and stroking their own Ego’s but I don’t think that’s true at all.  I think that by reporting the successes (and blunders) of our experiences, we can help to inspire a lot of other people to believe in themselves enough to try making money online as well.

So, while at first I was a bit hesitant about reporting things like this because I didn’t want it to seem like I’m bragging about winning an iTouch , I have come to realize that people need to be inspired with a strong WHY just as much as they need to be educated on all he “How To’s ” of making money online.

That’s why I’ll continue to report all of my successes if I feel that it will help to inspire some of my readers to take the plunge into making money doing what they love.

Thank you to Market Leverage for the great prizes and to Tyler Cruz for hosting the contest.

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