In a previous article mentioning Market Motive, I wrote that I’d be happy to write a review if granted access.
Well, Market Motive took me up on that offer and gave me free access to their service for a full month. This was soon after they launched and the quality of their program has only increased.
During my first month, I was able to interact with their experts (they call them faculty), watch several instructional videos, participate on their private forum and join one of their many topical workshops.
Before I get started, I wanted to make one thing very clear, this is NOT a paid review and I don’t have any relationships with anyone associated or affiliated with Market Motive. Ahhh, I’m glad I got that off my chest. Quite frankly, I felt like I needed to say that, not because of the dreaded “don’t pay for or publish paid reviews — Google imposed Internet law,” but because this review is overwhelmingly positive. As you’ll discover while reading this review, Market Motive is one of the best and most useful Internet marketing resources I’ve ever used.
What is Market Motive?
Market Motive was founded by Michael Stebbins, John Marshall and Avinash Kaushik. They wanted to provide a new and efficient way to get Internet marketing knowledge from industry leaders to people who practice Internet marketing for a living. They accomplished this through providing access to industry experts via a private forum, live (and recorded) workshops and instructional video courses. Their content covers the following key areas of Internet marketing:
- SEO
- Social Media
- Content Marketing
- Conversion Optimization
- Web Analytics
- PPC
- Mobile Marketing
- Email Marketing
They’ve built a team of Internet marketing consultants that cover each area:
- Avinash Kaushik on Web Analytics
- Bryan Eisenberg on Conversion Optimization
- Jennifer Evans Cario on Social Media
- Brad Geddes on PPC
- Todd Malicoat on SEO
- Danny Dover on SEO
- Jeff Hasen on Mobile Marketing
- Greg Jarboe on Video and Content Marketing
- Matt Bailey on Internet Marketing Fundamentals
Getting Started with the Forum
After you sign up, you’ll receive a welcome message encouraging you to introduce yourself to the other members and the “faculty.” Clicking on the button that says “Post an introduction here” takes you straight to their forum. Many of the posts were questions that were specific to the member’s website. It was nice to see that every question was addressed by one or more of the Market Motive faculty members, which included specialists in my field of Internet marketing (SEO), like Todd Malicoat. It was also nice to see that all users are bound to a strict non-disclosure agreement (NDA), which helps encourage open discussions about personal projects.
I wrote an introductory post, which is encouraged for all new members. That was promptly replied to by one of the faculty members and included a ton of helpful links to get me started. I then perused the forum for interesting discussions and was able to engage with a few members. In most instances, if a discussion wasn’t picked up by any of the other members, the faculty still participated.
Internet Marketing Workshops
Market Motive offers live workshops with the faculty. You can leave questions on the forum to be asked during the workshop, and then the moderator(s) will address it.
I chose to participate in the Web Analytics Workshop with Avinash Kaushik. I asked him about tracking external links that my visitors click on and how I could track them in Google Analytics. The cool thing was that I didn’t even have to wait until the workshop. If questions can be easily or quickly answered before the workshop, they’ll be answered in the forum (otherwise, they get tabled for the call). Within 15 minutes, Avinash left me a detailed answer to my question, including links to online resources to help me set things up correctly.
When I briefly logged in for the Web Analytics workshop, I was surprised to find out how many people participated in it.
One of the best things about the workshops is that they’re all recorded and then shared with every member. That ensures that you never miss out on anything, and if you’re new to Market Motive, you can go back and listen to any of the previous workshops. Also, since the questions are posted ahead of time in the forum, if you stumble upon a question that interests you, and the workshop has already taken place, you can simply click on it to hear it.
Internet Marketing Video Courses
Another core feature of Market Motive is video courses, specifically instructional videos. Similar to what I previously reported, Market Motive’s videos are created in a presentation format with voiceovers. The videos are similar to a well-structured presentation that you would find at any industry conference.
I watched several videos and all of them provided expert advice in a format that was easy to follow and learn from. They have many videos available right now and they appear to add new videos each month, which helps keep the content current and fresh.
Conclusion
When I originally saw the price — $299/month or $2,999 per year — for a self-paced membership, I had a hard time stomaching the price. I was really curious to know how they were going to justify it. However, after I got into the system and started using it, I quickly started to ask myself how they could be charging so little. You basically get access to an ever-expanding library of videos, workshops, and private discussion threads and get to interact directly with the faculty on a regular basis. Since it would typically cost $299 for 1-2 hours of consulting, I quickly started to realize what a great deal their service was.
So what’s the catch? I don’t think there really is a catch, other than to also promote their consultants’ “consulting” services. I think they’re banking on the fact that their members will eventually need more — more time, more attention to a big project, etc… In which case, they’ve made it easy to contact and hire one of the Internet marketing consultants for more in depth and private consulting. Makes sense to me.
Another important question is, “who is this service right for?” I think it will fit the needs of the following people:
- Solo Internet marketers (beginner, intermediate and experts that aren’t experts in every area)
- Small to medium-sized businesses needing Internet marketing assistance and training
- Businesses with in-house Internet marketing staff
- Anyone who wants to stay on top of the industry, but can’t attend the industry conferences
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Though this review was a few years ago, just wanted to say Thank You, as it was very informative and I have been looking more closely at the training provided by Market Motive for my team. Great write up!
makemoneymovie.info briefly and effective
Hey There,
I found out about Marketing Motive from a signature in an email a ” consultant” sent me.
Sadly, he talked a good game, but….
Nonetheless, I check out the site and was impressed. I called the info line to find out more and was incredibly lucky to hook-up with Scott who answered all my questions and make suggestions as to how i could best use the site.. 45 days later- extremely pleased. As a small business owner, I don’t have the resources to hire a lot of talent, which i need to stand out in my category. MM was a fount of info for me and better yet, I was able to work the classes
into my sometimes very crazy skd.
All in all: good info/well crafted presentation/very reasonable pricing for the access to good, actionable info.. Highly recommend Marketing Motive.
If you are a small business owner- you owe it to yourself to audit/ take appropriate classes- learn what you-yourself can do; what you should delegate and attain the knowledge to monitor and manage– K
Hey there K!
Thank you so much for your positive feedback. Your comment gave me the idea that we need to update this post. Raven is now a full partner with Market Motive because we believe in what they do.
Nicolette, thanks for updating this great article – we sure appreciate it. We’re so happy to know that people are seeing real actionable value from our curriculum. Great to see that K Fitz had recent success as well! That screen shot you’ve inserted is from our recently completely relaunched Foundations series, an introductory primer that covers all 8 critical disciplines. We’re super proud of that. And of course the more focused specialty courses are likewise constantly updated by our production team.. lots of exciting new stuff there too. Proud to have the support and partnership of Raven! — Chip Street, Marketing Manager, Market Motive
Hi Chip,
You are most welcome! This update was a team effort — my idea, @RavenNate chose the featured image and made sure the links were active and, of course, Jon’s unbiased review.