Sadly, various fakes and other dubious characters have tainted the word ‘guru’ in the how-to Internet marketing niche. While there really are some highly qualified Internet marketing gurus (i.e. teachers) around, they can be hard to spot amongst all the fakes.

Funnily enough, though, while the fake gurus certainly hurt a lot of people with their B.S. products… ultimately the joke is on them.

Today we profile Kikabink News reader Randall Thorne and his website, Peaceful Walks. Read on to discover how Randall combined backgrounds in environmental planning and computer science into an innovative business

Q:  What is Peaceful Walks and what inspired you to create it?

A:  Peaceful Walks is a virtual “nature sanctuary” where anyone can take a quick, relaxing break for free by watching our short-form, online nature videos.  Besides providing relaxation, Peaceful Walks also serves as a grassroots environmental advocacy service, empowering viewers to support their favorite environmental causes.  Since our videos are specially-crafted to mimick what you would see and hear if you were taking a relaxing walk in a wilderness area, we dubbed the website “Peaceful Walks”.

The inspiration for creating the website occurred during a canoe trip with some friends.  We were on a stream protected by a local environmental land trust.  The pristine water and adjoining lands were beautiful and very relaxing.  As I paddled, I was thankful the land trust had been able to protect the area from development but sad that so few people were aware of its existence.  Then, beside a flickering campfire late that night, an idea came to me – could the Internet be used to convey the special feeling of this place to a wider audience?  Late into the night I pondered the idea of combining my background in computers and nature videography into a technological solution to the problem. The eventual result was Peaceful Walks, a place where virtual “nature walks” can be taken without the need to arrange an actual trip, combined with a new way to support the organizations that preserve these precious places.

Q:  What is the big problem Peaceful Walks aims to solve? What are its key benefits for nature lovers and environmental organizations?

A:  Peaceful Walks not only promotes an appreciation of our natural environment through inspiring, relaxing videos, it also offers a unique new way to help protect and defend these natural places.  It is the combination of these two elements into a single, convenient online experience that sets Peaceful Walks apart.

Nature lovers can find a variety of free online nature videos on the Web, some short, some long, and of varying quality.  Peaceful Walks offers a library of dozens of free to watch, short-form videos of consistently high quality, allowing for a predictable viewing experience.  Each video averages about three minutes long, providing the optimum online “snacking” size for a quick nature break.  To keep the viewing experience pure and relaxed, the videos and the website contain no advertising.

In addition to providing a free library of beautiful nature videos, we also act as “facilitators”, by operating a grass roots environmental advocacy service. This service empowers individuals who want to take a more active role in supporting the environment.  Our viewers can choose to sponsor a video and in return, receive unique, shareable media custom created to promote the environmental organization of their choice.

The shareable media is either a still image or a short video trailer extracted from the sponsored video.  Both types can be personalized with not only the promoted environmental organization’s name but also the sponsor’s name.  The sponsor can then share the media with friends, family or their entire social network, showing not only their support for the environment in general, but also for a favorite environmental non-profit.

The benefit to the environmental organization is obvious, they receive widespread promotion of their cause entirely for free.  And since their fans are doing the promotion through their personal network of contacts, it is a much more effective form of promotion than they could ever hope to do on their own.  This helps stretch their limited funds, which can be reserved for preserving and protecting the environment instead of acquiring new patrons.

Q:  Can you explain exactly how it works?

A:  The process is quite simple.  After watching a video, the viewer has the option of sponsoring it.  A sponsorship supports the Peaceful Walks service and triggers creation of the shareable media used to promote their favorite environmental organization.   Sponsorships are processed as PayPal donations.  There is no pre-set donation amount, the sponsor can enter any amount desired.

The type of shareable media the sponsor receives depends on the amount donated.  For example, a donation of $10 will result in a still image with the chosen environmental non-profit’s name, while a donation of $30 will result in a personalized, 90-second video trailer containing both the organizaiton’s and sponsor’s names.  For videos, the sponsor receives a link to the video that can be shared or embedded as desired.  Donation amounts between $10-$30 will result in the creation of differing types of media fully described on our website.

In addition to supporting the overhead costs of the Peaceful Walks service and creation of the donor’s shareable media, donations are also shared with our supported environmental non-profits through our ongoing “10-for-10 Campaign”.  This quarerly campaign is a fun competition among sponsors that tracks which non-profits are currently receiving the most sponsorships.  At the end of each campaign, the winning organizations split a pot of 10% of all donated funds.

Q:  What is your vision for Peaceful Walks and how do you plan to build the business?

A:  It’s important to point out that our service supports environmental non-profits only, and is not available for commercial promotional purposes.  While this business decision will obviously affect our bottom-line, I feel it is important to stay true to the non-commercial aspect of nature conservancy.  It also offers other advantages, such as a more personal relationship with our sponsors and supported organizations.

Getting the word out about what we do is a continuing challenge, and with limited funds, advertising is not practical.  So, our primary marketing strategy is reliance on our sponsor’s personal networks to spread the word about our service.  Hopefully, the old adage “a picture is worth a thousand words” will play in our favor.

That being said, I envision Peaceful Walks growing and evolving as we continue to add new videos, respond to technical changes and adjust to the needs of our sponsors and non-profit organizations.  I enjoy what I’m doing and hope to be doing it for a long time, for as the name implies, Peaceful Walks is as much a way of life for me as it is a business.

As an entrepreneur and an Internet marketer you probably find yourself automatically thinking about how other businesses run and how they do their marketing.

Whether you’re visiting someone’s website or visiting the hairdresser, you’ll instinctively think about what they’re doing right, what they’re doing wrong and how you’d do things if you were in charge.

As part of an occasional series of reader profiles, here is a profile of long-time Kikabink News reader, Peter J. Prins, founder of Dynamic Small Business Websites.

Q: What is your background and why did you decide to get into Internet marketing?

A: I originally qualified in water treatment (a career ended by affirmative action in South Africa), then I was a freelance salesman and one man band for many years.

After the music ended due to a bad accident, there was only sales, and at one stage, retail management (fast food franchise). I hated the latter – working like a slave for $500 per month (considering the exchange rate at the time). I started exploring the internet – I KNEW there had to be some money floating around, and I just needed to tap into it.

Eventually I became a ghostwriter – which, even at my pathetic typing speed, paid better than my retail management job…:)

I learned. I experimented. Failed, and tried again. Slowly started making bit of money…

I had finally found a way to break free of all constraints…

All I had to do was to grow it.

Intellimon’s recent Traffic Survey 2010 (affiliate link) reveals some fascinating statistics about the Internet marketing community. The vast majority are male (82 percent) and just under half (49.7 percent) are aged 50 to 64 years old.

Produced in conjunction with the University of Bradford, The Traffic Survey 2010 is based on the responses of a few thousand subscribers to various Internet marketing lists. Since those who participated in the survey were invited to do so by individuals and companies in the how-to Internet marketing niche, the respondents are reasonably representative of the ‘Internet marketing niche’ as a whole.

Have you ever noticed how disaster, in a business context at least, seems to strike at the worst possible time?

Just when you’re about to launch your brand new product, the server crashes. Just when you’ve secured an important meeting with a major client, you’re delayed at the airport. Just when you’ve landed a huge sale, your merchant account provider freezes your account.

Why does it often happen like this? Why does disaster strike at the worst possible time… and what can we do about it?

I’ve always loved Nike’s slogan, ‘just do it’. It’s resonated with me as a runner and fitness enthusiast, as an entrepreneur, and as someone who tends to jump into things without letting fears about failing or what other people think stop me. But while ‘just doing it’ is essential for anyone wanting to start a business or embark on any major challenge… it’s not enough.

Indeed, as anyone who’s run a grueling race will know, the easy part is getting started.

The hard part is to keep going when it really, really hurts. When you’re body is screaming at you to stop. When nothing in the world would feel better than to just… stop… running…

LeadQual, LLC is the fastest growing Internet company in North America, growing by 5,725 percent in terms of fiscal year revenues between 2005 and 2009.

Based on Deloitte & Touche LLP’s 2010 Fast 500 list of the fastest growing technology companies in North America, eight (8) of the top 25 fastest growing Internet companies provide Internet marketing solutions.

Think about any sport in the Olympics and it’s safe to say that no athlete gets to LAST place – whether in the 100m sprint or the marathon – without aiming to be in FIRST place.

You just won’t make it all the way to the Olympics without having the mindset and training of someone who’s aiming to be the best. And that’s just to get into the finals, let alone win a medal, let alone the gold medal.

All those aiming to be ‘okay’ at running, or swimming, or weightlifting or whatever their sport is, don’t stand a chance of ever making it to the Olympics.

Well, like it or not, the same principle applies to business.

Back in the 1990s, I started my professional career as a junior copywriter at Grey Advertising. Working at Grey was the most fun I’ve ever had in a job, outside of building my own companies (which nothing can match). I also learned a lot about advertising and the advertising industry… including why an ad agency that is obsessed with winning awards is NOT an ad agency I’d want working for me. Instead, I want an ad agency that can do math…

You see, ad agencies that are obsessed with winning awards are not obsessed with marketing clients’ products. At the very least, marketing clients’ products comes second on their list of priorities. This isn’t exactly good for clients that are paying ad agencies a ton of money to create effective marketing campaigns.