When was the last time you purchased a computer?
These days, people mostly go to Best Buy or do their computer evaluation and shopping online. But a few years ago, ok, maybe more than a few, you'd go to a store that had a salesman who'd make commission on the sale.
Do you remember the days of attentive sales folks at Good Guys? Or CompUSA (before they were inattentive)?
Maybe attentive is the wrong word. Maybe high-pressure-can-you-stop-asking-me-questions-I-don't-know is a better word.
Because if you remember, they'd walk up to you and ask you if you wanted a Pentium chip, or how much RAM you wanted, or whether you needed onboard video RAM.
This was before Steve Jobs started defining products by how much music you could carry on it. Before we talked about how we'd use the devices and instead talk about the infrastructure of the device.
If you have purchased a computer in the last year or two, it's been different. These days some computers come with stickers on them telling you how many photos, videos and music you can store on it.
These are the good days. In computer shopping.
When was the last time you picked a hosting company?
But the good old days aren't yet here in hosting. You end up having to know if you want shared, dedicated, virtual private, or cloud hosting – all which means different things to different vendors.
On top of that, you need to know how much RAM you'll need – as if you could easily translate the number of visits you get into a RAM calculation in your head. And that's working under the assumption you have any clue how many visitors you'll get.
No, things are still difficult. At least when it comes to hosting.
When was the last time you set up a membership site?
If you've spent time here, you know that I spend a decent amount of time walking people thru membership plugins and how to select the right one, use it, and when it's time to move to another.
Over 70,000 folks have stopped by one of my membership posts since the start of 2014. That's a lot of people that have questions about membership sites.
And guess what? We're still in the stages where you have to tell me a decent amount of stuff before I can tell you which one is right for you.
Things aren't yet perfectly easy.
Am I just trying to make you depressed?
No. My point isn't to frustrate you by pointing out how hard things still are. Instead, it's to highlight that what's needed is some significant abstraction.
Someone to take all our needs and wants, hide all the technology, and make things easy.
Of course, if they did that, most of my site would be useless. Because you wouldn't need to know:
- How to pick the right web host?
- How to pick the right membership plugin?
- Which membership plugin is the easiest?
- How do you pick an eCommerce plugin?
On top of that, if someone took care of all that, and made it easy to think about segmentation and conversions, you wouldn't need my articles on those topics either:
If you've spent time reading those posts, you know I have been working hard to help you get a handle on all this, so that you can stay focused on your business.
But it's work. And let's be honest – I write daily (or try to). So there's a good chance you haven't read all those articles, because when it was published, you were like, “oh, right, another post by that guy who keeps filling my inbox.”
I know. It's ok. I'm trying to help – and that's why I made it so you can get posts weekly now (see orange box on the right).
So what if someone solved all that for you?
Yes, initially I might be a wee bit frustrated. After all, they would have made things better for you while likely lowering my traffic.
But let's be honest. The goal isn't my site or my traffic. It's you. It's keeping you focused on doing what you want to do in life, rather than turning into a system administrator.
And yesterday, someone did it. Released a platform that is built on WordPress but abstracted from WordPress. It doesn't look like WordPress. It looks better. Simpler. Easier. Faster. And it hides all the stuff you don't or won't want to deal with.
It takes care of your hosting. It takes care of your site's look (themes). It takes care of membership site features. And landing page features. It helps you with eCommerce.
It's focused on what matters most to you:
- Design
- Content
- Conversions
- Reporting
And it's just launched (yesterday). You can watch their video here.
Is this CopyBlogger product for you?
I'll be honest with you. I've purchased a lot of CopyBlogger products / content. I was part of the third tribe membership. And I took Teaching Sells. I've owned Scribe (twice), along with Premise (for landing pages), and did the Authority conference, plus joined their Authority membership site. Oh, and I use Genesis regularly.
You might think I'm a fanboy or something. But most of the time, I've done it to quietly watch what they were doing and evaluate it. And again, being honest, not all of their products have delighted me or overwhelmed me with joy.
So take this assessment for what it's worth. Know that it's not a paid review or sponsored content.
CopyBlogger's Rainmaker platform is a game-changer, because it hides all the technical stuff that makes WordPress less friendly than any of us ever want to admit, and keeps you focused on your product and your platform.
It's a game-changer because it puts the focus squarely on a customer orientation, rather than an infrastructure one. Instead of you having to decide about eCommerce, membership, or landing page solutions, you can focus on your content and conversions.
It's a game-changer because it makes hard things easy, while keeping easy things easy. Think about that for a second. Lots of people try to make hard things easy, but end up making some simple things a pain in the butt. Not so here.
For non-technical people who are coaches, consultants, startups, entrepreneurs, solopreneurs, advisors, authors, speakers or small business owners – you've been frustrated long enough having to answer questions about RAM, hosting platforms, disk speeds, theme decisions, membership features, and more.
Rainmaker takes all that stress away and puts you in the driver's seat to focus on winning at your business.
That's my take.
Will I be recommending it to folks that fit that profile? Yup. Will I be signing up? Already did.