Have you ever have that sick feeling in your stomach…
You know, when something bad happens…
Then you’ll know exactly how I felt when I got out of a cab and saw it driveaway…
A couple years back I was attending a marketing conference in Phoenix USA.
I had flown in to attend an event called InfusionCon…
This was a large event with many thousands of people attending…
I decided to stay at an air B&B not too far away…
Anyway the event went well and my air B&B was excellent…
I decided to stay an extra couple of days to do some sightseeing…
My plan was to hire a plane and fly out to the Grand Canyon the following day…
Now being vegan I always try to take my own food when possible…
In other words I don’t always bank on vegan options being available…
So my plan was to visit a local supermarket near my air B&B…
And get some stuff to make some sandwiches…
I found a local supermarket using Google maps and then booked am Uber cab.
I got in the cab I realise my phone was running low on charge…
The cab driver told me I could plug my phone in to the charging cable he had if I liked…
Perfect…
About 15 minutes later we finally got to the supermarket and he dropped me off…
I closed the door and watch the cab driveaway…
I then realised I didn’t have my phone with me…
It was then that I had that sinking sick feeling in my stomach…
I suddenly realised everything about my trip was on my phone…
The address of where I was staying
The pin number for the front door of the air B&B
The contact name and number of the person who owned the air B&B
Hell I didn’t even know the phone numbers of my friends and family in the UK!
So there I was standing in the car park of this supermarket…
In what seemed to be a rather sketchy part of town…
I didn’t have my mobile phone or passport…
I had no idea where I was staying….
And had no way to contact my friends and family!
I remember just standing in the car park and not really knowing what to do!
It was starting to get dark…
And like I said this definitely seemed to be a rather sketchy part of town…
Now I said everything was on my phone…
Well not exactly…
I had all the information I needed on a Google document…
I had a printout of this document back at the air B&B…
So my thought was if I could just purchase a new phone I would be able to log onto my Google account and retrieve the information…
I think it was between 8 and 9 PM…
So I went into the supermarket to see if they sold mobile phones…
I asked one of the cashiers if they sold mobile phones and she gave me a funny look.
After chatting to one of the security guards he recommended that I go to the local Walmart store which was a few miles away…
Luckily I had some cash on me and one of my credit cards…
I got a cab to the Walmart store and sure enough they sold mobile phones…
I purchased the cheapest android phone I could find and also a pay as you go plan.
One of the guys behind the counter very kindly set it all up for me…
However I was not able to log onto any of my accounts!
It was asking for two factor authentication!
There was no way to access any of my information in my Google account..
I was locked out…
I must’ve been in that store for two or three hours!
Finally I set up a new Google account using a different username…
Downloaded the Skype app…
Amazingly I actually remembered my password for Skype…
And voilà I was in…
My contacts in my Skype account appeared…
I was able to call Kathy Russell on my helpdesk…
It was about six in the morning for her and luckily she answered the phone.
She was then able to access my Google account and send me my itinerary…
In the end I was able to contact Uber and get my mobile phone back..
The trip to the Grand Canyon was great fun…
I got to fly co-pilot in the fixed wing and enjoyed an excellent helicopter ride down into the Grand Canyon!
This all taught me a valuable lesson…
Always have a backup plan…
And don’t have all your eggs in one basket….
Now whenever I go on a long trip outside the country…
I still have a two or three page itinerary with all of the information I need…
I still have a printout of that itinerary….
And yes I still save it in the cloud…
However I make sure that my itinerary is publicly available….
In other words I don’t need to put a username and password in to see the itinerary….
All I need to do is memorise a short domain name…
I use one of my domain name forwarders….
For example….
sarahlink. com/usatrip
The above link is not real….
So if I lost all of my luggage, and my purse was stolen…
All I would need to do is go and find a computer in a store or hotel…
And type in that link and my itinerary would appear….
I would instantly have access to all the information I need….
Also whenever I fly abroad now I always travel with photo copies of my passport and credit cards…
What’s on my itinerary…
Basically everything to do with the trip…
Hotels or air B&B addresses and phone numbers…
Important phone numbers of friends and family…
Insurance information and policy numbers…
Flight numbers and any information about my Visa…
Passport number…
Like I said it’s always good to have a backup plan…
And the same is true with marketing….
You should never be getting all your traffic from one source….
You should never be making all of your income from promoting one affiliate product….
As you probably heard before one is the worst number in business….
This is why I like to market using parallel marketing channels….
If you do this correctly you can make a really good income from a tiny list of 200 people!
Earlier in the year I made a video about this…
When you market to your audience using parallel marketing channels…
You really don’t need a very large list…
Oh yeah and that list doesn’t necessarily need to be an email list…
Must go now as I’m just putting my itinerary together for my three month trip to Thailand…
I definitely don’t want to find myself in the same situation when I’m in the Asia!
That’s why I don’t just have one backup plan I’ve got three!
Have a great Friday whatever you’re doing,
Sarah Staar