to your Copy! - Instant Niche Products

Transcription

Instant Niche Products – How to Turn Your Idea into a Profitable Product in as little as 24 hours!
roducts
iche P
nstant N
IInstant
Products
Niche
How to Turn Your Idea into a
Profitable Product in as little as 24 hours!
By Fabio Marciano
SPECIAL BONUS: Make Sure You GRAB Your “UNADVERTISED BONUSES” by
sending an email to: [email protected]
-1© 2005, Fabio Marciano – All Rights Reserved
http://www.InstantNicheProducts.com
A
ote tto
o YYou
ou M
yR
eader
AN
Note
My
Reader
WARNING:
What you are about to read will completely change the way you view some of your most
cherished authors and celebrities. I’m exposing some of the secrets they used to get to
where they are today.
In doing so, I hope you learn a thing or two about how to replicate their success for your
own business, so that YOU can become a wealthy celebrity in just 30 days…or less!
This e-book is the one of the first of its kind, so I hope you enjoy it. I take great pride in
having researched it and edited it down to the bare essentials that you will need. It turned
out to be a little longer than I had intended, but I felt as though I had to include all the
material within this e-book manual. I hope you enjoy the results of all our efforts.
I believe that you will not only enjoy it, but profit from it as well. Please take the time to
read through it on your screen or by printing it out and taking notes in the margins.
Whatever method you choose, please keep a notepad and pen by your side. I want you to
take action on the materials every step of the way. If you haven’t signed up for the e-course
that will walk you through the 30 days of steps, actions to take and secret strategies, then
you MUST sign up now by clicking on the link below or sending an email to:
mailto:[email protected]
Okay, let’s keep this going. We know you’re anxious to get started.
Fabio
This is NOT a free e-Book!
If you’re interested in making money from this book, see page 4!
Copyright © 2004 by Fabio Marciano. All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval
system, without permission in writing from the Publisher.
The information in this e-book is intended for educational purposes only.
Published by Four Green Houses Press, Harrison, NY
Division of The Wealthy Pauper, LLC, P.O Box 676, Harrison, NY 10528
www.thewealthypauper.com
First Edition
ISBN
Cover design by Max Covers
Edited by The ALM Group
Limits of Liability/Disclaimer of Warranty:
This publication is designed to provide competent and reliable information regarding the subject matters covered. However, it is published
with the understanding that the publisher and author are not engaged in rendering legal, financial, accounting, or other professional
services. Laws and practices often vary from state to state and if legal or other expert assistance is required, the services of a professional
should be sought. The publisher and author specifically disclaim any liability that is incurred from the use or application of the contents of
this book.
The authors and publisher of this book and the accompanying materials have used their best efforts in preparing this program. The authors
and publisher make no representation or warranties with respect to the accuracy, applicability, fitness, or completeness of the contents of
this program. They disclaim any warranties (expressed or implied), merchantability, or fitness for a particular purpose. The authors and
publisher shall in NO event be held liable for any loss or other damages, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or
other damages. As always, the advice of a competent legal, tax, accounting or other professional should be sought. The authors and
publisher do not warrant the performance, effectiveness or applicability of any sites listed in their book. All links are for information
purposes only and are not warranted for content, accuracy or any other implied or explicit purpose.
This manual/text contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or
use of this material is prohibited.
YYou
ou C
an M
ake M
oney w
ith tthis
his ee-bo
-boookk!
!
Can
Make
Money
with
I know I’ve written a great e-book that’s going to help you succeed at writing your own e-book. I
know this thanks to the feedback I’ve received from my inner circle members and the experts I’ve
sent it out to for an advance review. I think you’ll enjoy this book as well, which is why we think
you’d be perfect to help me sell it.
You see, the best person to sell a great product is the people who already own it.
So, are you interested in making a 50% commission just by recommending this e-book to people?
All you have to do is send an endorsement letter to your opt-in subscriber list or your customer
database. I’ll handle the rest.
I’ll pay you 50% for every sale you make and my affiliate program pays out twice a month!
For simple emails, tricks and tools you can use to help make selling this e-book easy for you, just
visit:
www.CashMoreChecks.com/affiliates.htm
Go there now to find out how you can make 50% commissions just by helping me spread the word
about this great resource.
Again, I’ve made it as turnkey as possible for you. All you have to do is sign up for the program, get
your affiliate link and you could be earning commissions in as little as one hour from now!
www.CashMoreChecks.com/affiliates.htm
Yes, one hour from now you could be making 50% commissions for little (well practically no)
work!
A
bout tthe
he A
uthor
About
Author
Fabio “fabman” Marciano
Fabio is the author of The Secrets of Wealth and The Wealthy Pauper.
He is also the president of The Wealthy Pauper, LLC a company whose mission it is to help
educate people about investing and personal development. He has been called the #1
Personal and Financial Freedom Coach on the Internet and he works. He writes The
Million Dollar Dream, his ezine on personal and financial wealth. Subscribe now at
http://www.FabmanSecrets.com
He is also the author and co-author of some other best-selling e-books, including:
Write It FAST! How to Write a Book in 30 Days…or less
“Sick of carrying that book idea of yours around in your head? Well now you can follow this
simple seven step process to get your book written in 30 days…or less.”
www.WriteItFAST.com
The One Minute eBook
“The Surprisingly Simple Way to Write, Publish & Profit from Your Own eBook!”
www.TheOneMinuteEbook.com
Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!
“Discover How You Can Become an Overnight Success Story and Make Gobs of Money with
Your Instant Celebrity Status!”
www.BecomeAnExpertin30Days.com
Teleseminar Magic
“How You Can Get ANY Guru to Create and Promote Your Products, and Build Your List for
FREE!”
www.TeleseminarMagic.com
Instant Bestseller
“How ANY Book Can Become a Bestseller.”
www.InstantBestseller.com
And 14 others that are in the works. Well more like 12 with 2 physical books in
development. Hey, when you can write an e-book in One Minute (see above), you’d have 12
e-books in the hopper too!
Fabio lives in New Jersey with his beautiful wife Amy and their bulldog Otis. He obviously
enjoys writing, helping others with their finances & starting a part-time business. When
he’s not working, he’s working.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
IIInstant
n
iicch
rro
nssttaan
ntt N
N
hee P
P
od
du
uccttss .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................111
Niche
Products
A
N
o
t
e
t
o
Y
o
u
M
y
eeaaddeerr.................................................................................................................... 2
A
N
o
t
e
t
o
Y
o
u
M
y
R
A Note to You My R
Reader
Y
o
u
C
a
n
M
a
k
e
M
o
n
eeyy w
iitthh ttthis
hhiiss eee-bo
--bboooookkk!!!............................................................................................ 4
Y
o
u
C
a
n
M
a
k
e
M
o
n
w
You Can Make Money
with
A
bboouutt ttthe
hhee A
uutthhoorr...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................555
A
A
About
Author.
Can You Really Do It?........................................................................................................................... 9
The Idea Avalanche............................................................................................................................. 17
S
tteep
11 ––– F
iin
o
ttaarrvviin
rro
S
p ###1
F
nd
dY
Y
ou
urr S
S
ng
gC
C
ow
wd
d .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................2220
Step
Find
Your
Starving
Crowd
00
Target Market First, Product Second ............................................................................................... 20
Become a Problem Solver .................................................................................................................. 23
Evaluating Your Niche........................................................................................................................ 24
Lazy? Here are Some Killer Categories to Go After ....................................................................... 28
S
tteep
sskk T
h
h
h
aan
S
p##22 ––– A
A
T
heem
mW
W
haatt T
T
heeyy W
W
ntt ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................3331
Step#2
Ask
Them
What
They
Want
11
Survey Says? ........................................................................................................................................
31
TM
M
aaand
S
tteep
n
eesstt Y
22aa ––– Q
o
u
rro
d
S
nd
dT
p ###2a
T
Y
ou
urr P
Q
uiicckkS
P
Stto
od
du
orrm
ucctt IIIdeas
mTTM
deeaass ........................................................................................................................................................................3335
Step
Test
Your
QuickStorm
Product
55
Your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)........................................................................................... 39
20 Ways to Beat Your Competition .................................................................................................. 40
Will it be a Profitable Product? ......................................................................................................... 43
The Importance of Creating a Hook ................................................................................................. 51
“Chicken Soup” and “Hypnotic-ize” Your Products ....................................................................... 53
S
tteep
33 ––– G
iivvee IIIt
tt T
o
h
S
p ###3
G
T
oT
T
heem
m ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................5554
Step
Give
To
Them
44
S
tteep
33aa ––– C
rreeaattee aaa S
eexxyy T
iittllee fffor
o
o
rro
S
p ###3a
C
S
T
orr Y
Y
ou
urr P
P
od
du
ucctt ............................................................................................................................................................................................................5555
Step
Create
Sexy
Title
Your
Product
55
Communicating Your Product Benefits ........................................................................................... 55
Choose a Title that’s Full of Benefits and Solutions ....................................................................... 56
S
tteep
33b
eett Y
o
o
aam
o
S
p ###3b
b ––– G
G
Y
ou
urr D
D
om
maaiin
nN
N
mee &
&
H
ossttiin
ng
g .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................6661
Step
Get
Your
Domain
Name
&H
Hosting
11
Y
o
u
M
u
s
t
G
e
t
a
K
i
l
l
e
r
D
o
m
a
i
n
N
a
m
e
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
11
Y
ou M
ust G
et aa K
illleer
rD
omain N
ame ............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................6661
You
Must
Get
Kil
Domain
Name
P
llu
o
eett aaa lllist
iisstt o
ff sssimilar
iim
eeaarrcch
o
n
o
fftteen
h
eerree sssearched.
eeaarrcch
22
P
uss yyyou’l
ou
u’’lllll ggget
o
miillaarr sssearch
hw
w
orrd
dss aaand
nd
dh
h
ow
wo
o
n ttthey
heeyy w
w
heed
d.. .........6662
Plus
of
words
how
often
were
Web Hosting ........................................................................................................................................ 64
Accepting Payment ............................................................................................................................. 64
S
tteep
33cc ––– C
rreeaattee Y
o
yysstteem
rr S
o
S
p ###3c
C
Y
ou
urr S
S
mo
o
S
ollu
uttiio
on
n .................................................................................................................................................................................................................................6666
Step
Create
Your
System
or
Solution
66
Create a System ................................................................................................................................... 66
S
tteep
33d
rreeaattee Y
o
rro
S
p ###3d
d ––– C
C
Y
ou
urr P
P
od
du
ucctt ..........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................6669
Step
Create
Your
Product
99
B
eecco
n
xxp
22
B
om
mee aaan
nE
E
peerrtt ...............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................7772
Become
Expert
H
o
o
h
tt B
ee aaand
n
h
o
11
H
ow
wL
L
on
ng
gS
S
ho
ou
ulld
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B
nd
dW
W
haatt C
C
ollo
orr?
? .............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8881
How
Long
Should
Be
What
Color?
S
tteep
33ee --- P
o
o
rro
S
p ###3e
P
olliissh
hY
Y
ou
urr P
P
od
du
ucctt ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................8884
Step
Polish
Your
Product
44
Standing Out in the Crowd ............................................................................................................ 84
Polishing It........................................................................................................................................... 85
Pricing Your Product .......................................................................................................................... 90
S
tteep
33ff ––– G
eett Y
o
o
n
rraap
o
o
iillllleeer
rr W
eeb
S
p ###3f
G
Y
ou
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C
ovveerr aaand
nd
dG
G
ph
hiiccss fffor
orr Y
Y
ou
urr K
K
W
b--S
Siittee ..................................................................................................................9992
Step
Get
Your
Cover
Graphics
Your
Kil
Web-Site
22
Your Professional Looking Product.................................................................................................. 92
S
tteep
44aa ––– P
llaan
o
aacckkeen
S
p ###4a
P
nY
Y
ou
urr B
B
nd
d ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................9994
Step
Plan
Your
Backend
44
The Profit is in the Back-End ............................................................................................................ 94
Don't Get Infected By The Twenty Dollar Ebook Syndrome......................................................... 95
Plan Your Back-End BEFORE You Start Selling Stuff ................................................................... 99
The Funnel System – Examples of Products in Your Pipeline...................................................... 99
Plan Your “Backend” Before You Write Your Book ...................................................................... 104
Pricing Your Products....................................................................................................................... 104
Pricing Levels for Every Purse and Pocket .................................................................................... 105
How Much Money Will You Make? ................................................................................................ 105
Value Per Visitor ............................................................................................................................... 108
S
tteep
44b
rreeaattee Y
o
o
iillee O
n
S
p ###4b
b ––– C
C
Y
ou
urr B
B
on
nu
uss P
P
O
n ...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................110
Step
Create
Your
Bonus
Pile
On
111100
S
tteep
44cc ––– C
rreeaattee Y
o
ffffeerr (((incl.
iin
o
h
eeaad
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o
S
p ###4c
C
Y
ou
urr O
O
nccll.. 999 W
W
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dss ttthat
haatt L
L
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oM
M
on
nss)) .................................................................................................1
Step
Create
Your
Offer
Words
Lead
Mil
1133
..1113
Standing Out from the Crowd (Part Deux).................................................................................... 113
Tell Your Story................................................................................................................................... 114
S
tteep
55 ––– G
eett T
eessttiim
n
iin
p
o
o
een
aarrttn
S
p ###5
G
T
mo
on
niiaallss aaand
nd
dL
L
nee U
U
pY
Y
ou
urr JJJoint
oiin
ntt V
V
nttu
urree P
P
neerrss ..........................................................................................11117
Step
Get
Testimonials
Line
Up
Your
Venture
Partners
1177
A Jury of Your Peers ......................................................................................................................... 117
Joint Venture Partners ..................................................................................................................... 119
S
tteep
66 ––– W
rriittee Y
o
iillllleeer
rr S
aalleess L
eettttteeer
rr ................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11127
S
p ###6
W
Y
ou
urr K
K
S
L
Step
Write
Your
Kil
Sales
Let
2277
Your Swipe File – Modeling Success .............................................................................................. 127
Killer Headlines that SELL .............................................................................................................. 129
S
tteep
77 ––– D
eevveello
o
eeb
S
p ###7
D
op
pY
Y
ou
urr W
W
b--S
Siittee ..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11135
Step
Develop
Your
Web-Site
3355
Eight Golden Rules For Your Website............................................................................................ 135
Sales Page Basics............................................................................................................................... 139
Search Engine Optimization............................................................................................................ 140
Steps To Optimizing Your HTML Codes ....................................................................................... 140
Autoresponders ................................................................................................................................. 142
Web Design Software........................................................................................................................ 145
S
tteep
77aa ––– D
eevveello
rraaffffiicc B
u
S
p ###7a
D
op
pT
T
B
uiilld
deerrss ..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................11148
Step
Develop
Traffic
Builders
4488
S
tteep
88 ––– D
eevveello
o
aacckkeen
rro
S
p ###8
D
op
pY
Y
ou
urr B
B
nd
dP
P
od
du
uccttss ..............................................................................................................................................................................................................................11169
Step
Develop
Your
Backend
Products
6699
S
tteep
99 ––– T
eessttiin
o
iittee aaand
n
o
IIV
S
p ###9
T
ng
gY
Y
ou
urr S
S
nd
dG
G
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ng
gL
L
VE
E!! .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................171
Step
Testing
Your
Site
Going
LIVE!
117711
S
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99aa ––– P
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S
p ###9a
P
om
mo
ottiin
ng
g ttthe
hee P
P
od
du
ucctt ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................175
Step
Promoting
Product
117755
List Building 101................................................................................................................................ 176
Lifetime Value of a Customer .......................................................................................................... 177
It’s Not the Size of the List that Counts (Seriously)...................................................................... 178
SELLING TO YOUR LIST ................................................................................................................ 187
Giver’s Get.......................................................................................................................................... 189
S
tteep
99b
u
o
rrm
o
ffffiilliiaatteess)) .....................................................................................................................................................................................................................190
S
p ###9b
b ––– B
B
uiilld
diin
ng
gY
Y
ou
urr A
A
myy (((of
off A
A
Step
Building
Your
Army
Affiliates)
119900
Your Own Affiliate Program ............................................................................................................ 190
S
tteep
99cc ––– M
aakkiin
aacckkeen
aalleess ...........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................192
S
p ###9c
M
ng
gB
B
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dS
S
Step
Making
Backend
Sales
119922
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offiittiin
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Step #10 – Maintenance Mode (((Profiting
Whi
You
Sleep)
9966
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tteep
1111 ––– D
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vveerr A
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aan
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gaaiin
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Do
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ttaarrtteed
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Get
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THANK
YOU…NOW
START
CREATING
THAT
FIRST
PRODUCT…NOW!
0022
..2202
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Y
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Your
QuickStart
Checklist
Profits!
220033
Author’s Note
Welcome to your new career!
Yes, whether you realize it or not, you’re about to embark on a new career as an information
entrepreneur or an infopreneur as the “title” is often called. I’m glad you’ve decided to join
the crowd that’s making tons of money from the knowledge inside their heads and the heads
of the partners they leverage.
I bet you already know the value and importance of marketing your own information
product if you really want to make a lot of money. This manual will show you how to create
and market your very own product quickly and easily so that you can then move on to
creating and profiting from the next product. It’s all about creating lots of products so that
you can create additional streams of income for you and your family.
One of the things that attracted me to selling information products is how easy and simple it
was to create products once you had the blueprint and the formula for creating them in
front of you. It was a struggle for me to create my first information product, a book called
The Secrets of Wealth but I soon learned how to write books and create quality
information products quickly and that’s what this manual is all about: giving you the ability
to profit from the ideas inside your head.
And when I say profit, I’m talking potentially thousands of dollars per month. That’s right
per MONTH if you pick a good enough niche, create a decent product and market the heck
out of it.
“If you’re creating and selling information, you’ll never go out of business.”
– Michael LeBoeuf
Please go ahead right now and print out this manual, punch holes in it and stick it in a plain
white binder (or a fancy color, it’s up to you). I want you to take notes in the margins and
Post-ItTM notes if you have to, but don’t just gloss over the subjects and breeze through the
manual. Ideally you’re going to read the manual from start to finish before you do anything.
That’s right, I want you to read through this entire manual BEFORE you think of you killer
idea or start writing your sales copy. The reason? I want you to understand the process
behind creating and marketing a great product before you run off and don’t finish this
manual.
After you’ve read the manual, take a look at the QuickStart Guide at the end and go through
the steps that are listed. This will help you stay on track and make sure you don’t miss
anything in your quest for instant riches.
Okay, enough chatter. Let’s get started!
Can You Really Do It?
Hardly any of my e-book coaching clients really think they can write an e-book. They’ve
been trying for weeks, months and years to create a product, but they’ve failed for one
reason or another. Then when I show them HOW to do it, they’re amazed at how easy it can
be to create an information product. My hope is that after reading this manual you’ll come
to realize that you CAN create information products, sometimes overnight!
But before we get into how to do it, let’s talk about Why and Why Not?
Why? Well, we know why you need to create information products:
To Make Money
To Help People
To Make Money
To Share Your Knowledge
To Make Money
But now let’s talk about Why Not? As in, why not you. Why can’t you create an information
product? There are hundreds of people like YOU out there who just put their head down
and kept on going and going until they created their information product and eventually
created passive incomes that are borderline obscene.
Really? Are there really everyday people out there making hundreds or thousands of dollars
every month from selling the information inside their head?
The simple answer is YES!!!!
You Can Just Go to the Internet. Why Pay?
“But everything I’d be sharing is available FREE on the Internet.”
I get this a lot from my coaching clients. My response is “So what?”
The truth is that 99% of what you will be sharing in your information products IS on the
Internet, but there are two key differences:
•
•
Your unique perspective and story
The Convenience Factor - You’re packaging the information for easy consumption
While the Internet is technically free and there are dozens upon dozens of places they can
go to find solutions and information, people are very willing to pay for good quality
information, especially if the information is helping them solve a big problem of
theirs. Your job is to solve problems with your information products. More on this in a
second.
The Power of YOU – You bring your unique story, spin, hook and personality to the
material. You’re able to bond with your reader and make the information easy-to-read or
easy-to-understand or maybe you make it entertaining. Do not underestimate what you
bring to the table.
Your Packaging – Yes someone can probably go online and find all the information that
you provide in your product, but they’re going to spend hours and hours and have to scour
through a lot of CRAP to find the solutions they want and need. If you’re skeptical, you’re
going to quickly realize that there is a hungry market out there for almost any niche and
they’re smart enough to realize that spending $27 or $47 for an e-book is a lot cheaper than
wasting hours or days looking for information online.
But Can I Really Do It?
I hate it when people doubt themselves because I struggled with self-doubt and low selfesteem before finally kicking the negative self-talk habit as I like to call it. My short answer
is that “Yes, you can take the knowledge in your head and YES you’ll have more than one
customer buying from you if you use my formula.” Don’t believe me, let’s look at some
“ordinary people” making extraordinary income from selling information.
How about my friend Willie Crawford who is selling a cookbook online. Yes, a cookbook
and he makes over $100,000 a year selling them. Yes, you read that right: $100,000 for
selling an e-book.
How about the woman who’s sold 241,000 e-books. Her topic? How she cured herself of
arthritis. She’s nothing special. She just had something to talk about and apparently a few
people wanted to hear what she had to say. Make that 241,000 people!
How about the auto mechanic that is out there warning people and teaching them not to get
ripped off by their auto mechanic. He makes a healthy monthly income from his one ebook. It’s all passive. It’s almost all pure profit.
Take my good friend Tom who was a gym owner and personal trainer who jumped on the
information products bandwagon and is selling e-books by the boatload.
Or how about me and the thousands I’ve made from one simple product that I created in 12
hours. I made over $3,148.96 from one phone call. Now that’s amazing.
My point is that you can do this. You can be successful at creating products from your
knowledge and selling them for huge profits. There’s nothing special about me or any of the
other people I listed above. They just had the dream for a better life and they went for it.
- 10 © 2005, Fabio Marciano – All Rights Reserved
The power of this manual is in the simplicity of the instructions I will give you. It’s in the
simplicity of the steps you will take in order to succeed in creating income-generating
products virtually overnight. I’ve spent a great deal of time and money creating a manual
that you can instantly put into practice.
My hope is that you make a small fortune through selling products that you either create or
bring to market…FAST! I don’t want you to spend months and months working on creating
products and putting up your web-sites. That’s just not fun and not an effective use of your
time.
This manual will take away all that pain and frustration you feel every time you try and
think of what you should be doing next during the day or what step you need to complete.
I’ve provided you with a critical set of templates that will walk you through the process of
creating, promoting and selling your products online.
I’ve striped away all the crap and hype that you’ve probably found in other ebooks and courses. I know how annoying it can be to read through 40 pages to find an
action step or something of value. I sent this manual out some of the big names in Internet
Marketing and I had them cut it up and trim it down and add their critical words and key
insights where necessary to make it the best manual you could possibly buy to help you
jump start the creation of your first, second and third products and beyond.
If you haven’t realized it by now, once you get this manual in your hands, you’re going to
realize that it’s not about just giving you theory and information, it’s about giving you the
simple steps you can take to learn how to create products again and again and again.
This is not a Cookie Cutter Blueprint Pushing Hype Machine
Please realize that the templates and steps I have included are not so specific that you’ll be
forced to create only eBooks or host teleseminars. The truth is that different creation
methods work for different products and not every one of those is going to work for you.
That’s why I’m not going to push any one product type on you.
How Long Is It Going To Take?
I’m going to be honest with you here. It can take you less than 24 hours to create and sell
your first product. It’s possible, but not highly likely for someone who has no experience at
creating products.
Creating your first product within 14 to 28 is more reasonable. I believe that this is a
realistic goal for the first time infopreneur and it means that you’re going to be putting in
anywhere from 28 to 56 hours…or more to create your first product.
That’s really the minimum because most infopreneurs spend much more time than that,
they just tell you that they took less time to sell you on the fact that it’s so easy to do.
An Idea + Taking Some Action = Thousands
An Idea + Planning + Taking Action + Revising Your Plan = Hundreds of Thousands
A Great Idea + Detailed Planning + Taking MASSIVE Action + Revising Your
Plan As You Get Feedback from Your Customers = Millions
I wrote the above to impress upon you how much of a factor YOU are in your success story.
You decide how much time and effort you put into creating and marketing your product.
Just realize here and now that you and you alone control your destiny. It’s up to you to
choose whether you want to make a few hundred a month or a few thousand or several
thousand dollars a month with your products. It’s all in your hands. It’s what you do with
the information in this manual that will determine your future.
The information I share with you will only be valuable and profitable to you if you take
action. Too many people out there buy great products, e-books and other courses, but never
do anything with them. Make the commitment to take action for 30 days straight and you’ll
be amazed at the results you achieve.
Take Consistent and Persistent ACTION and you’ll be cashing more checks
than you ever thought possible.
Are you ready to take the next step????
Are You Nervous? Excited? Skeptical?
You’re probably having a lot of emotions after reading the previous page. I know that when
one of my coaches revealed how many clients he had and what he charged I was floored. I
had seen his rise from an author to a coach and a well-known speaker and well, I just
couldn’t believe how quickly he had climbed…and how quickly he was generating cash.
Perhaps you’re a bit skeptical that producing information products could be so easy…but it
really is. I’m going to show you using my personal experience and case studies of others
that have created products virtually overnight that continue to generate income for them
years after they were first released.
Perhaps you’re concerned and nervous about the next few days and months that are to
come. Maybe you’re a bit scared of what comes next or unsure of whether you really have it
in you to create a niche product that can make you rich.
If this is you, do me a favor and suspend your disbeliefs and forget the past and your
previous attempts at creating an information product. Let’s start fresh and let’s work from
the mindset of “What’s Possible” instead of “I Can’t.”
I’m going to help you along your journey from a person filled with ideas to a person with a
product that’s selling on autopilot. I’m going to show you how to figure out the best and
fastest way to profit from the knowledge that’s already inside your head.
Who am I and Why am I Qualified to Help You?
I am a full-time employee of a major corporation. I remain at my job despite having made
thousands of dollars selling infoproducts during the past few months. I will not leave my
job until I create a sustainable passive income stream that far exceeds my current expenses.
I created my first infoproduct, a book called The Secrets of Wealth over the span of 3
years. I made many mistakes during the writing, publishing and promoting of that book. I
revised my system of writing and I soon had written my second book The Wealthy
Pauper in less than 3o days. I launched those 2 books simultaneously in October of 2003
and both hit the Amazon.com best-seller list. Despite its “best-seller” status, I lost money
on the product. Make that a lot of money.
It’s no wonder that my next infoproduct was an e-book, which had virtually no costs to
create and practically cost nothing to promote. The e-book, Write It Fast! How to Write
a Book in 30 Days…or less! was created in the span of 7 days. It was profitable after the
first day I launched it.
That’s called learning from your mistakes. Actually, I launched another product via a
teleseminar that made me $3,148.96 in the first week I offered it to the public.
And since then I have created Teleseminar Magic and The One Minute eBook in the
span of only 3 weeks. Both have sold very well during the test phase and will sell even
better once I actually launch them. That’s right, I’m making sales off of them and I haven’t
even officially launched the two products. I’ll show you how to do that later on in this
manual.
But back to me and who I was prior to writing my first book. I never thought I had any
knowledge inside me that someone would be willing to pay for. Then my friend Mike
Litman made me realize that I did have some knowledge that was worth selling. He asked
me:
“What do I do that’s common sense that I think everyone does well, but if truth
be told there are tons of people that wold love to learn what I do?”
And the answer was staring me in the face: my passion for helping people with their
finances. Then like the true schizophrenic that I am, I had another passion for writing and
creating information products and that’s why I’m sharing my knowledge with you today.
But back to you…
You my friend have a passion that you’re very knowledgeable about, something that you
love to do, that can be quickly and easily be turned into an information product. I made a
lot of mistakes from the discovery of my core passion to the creation of profitable products,
but you don’t have to suffer the wasted cash I spent on foolish products, traffic-generators
and mis-steps. You just have to read this manual and follow the simple steps that I have
laid out for you.
I have interviewed e-book authors who make hundreds of dollars a month and I’ve talked
with e-book authors who are making thousands per month. I work with coaches who are
making more in a month than most are making in a year. I have their best tips, strategies
and secrets all on display within this manual.
So it’s about time that you realize that you have in front of you two paths that you can take.
You can continue walking on the path that you’ve been walking down your entire life or you
can take the other path, the entrepreneurial path that leads to Financial Freedom.
So, what are you waiting for? Let’s get started…
Some Assumptions
The contents of this e-book and the system I will share with you make some assumptions
about you and the resources you currently have. If you don’t have these resources at your
disposal, you should seriously look into getting your hands on them.
!
!
!
!
Access to the Internet
E-mail account(s)
Basic typing skills
Web-site
Area of Interest – You don’t necessarily have to have a specific niche that you’re
interested in just yet, but it helps to have it narrowed down somewhat. If you’re reading
this and you’re debating between creating products about personal finance, how to write
books, and how to make money through your hobby, then we might have a problem. You’re
going to burn a lot of time deciding which niche to focus in on. Focus, focus, focus!
Of course I’m going to teach you how to sell an information product for any category and
any niche, but it does help you in the long run to have already done your “dreaming” and
have thought about the area that you want to play in.
Why I Love Information Products and You Will Too!
Low Startup Costs – If you already have a computer and an Internet connection, you’re
looking at a $7.95 investment for a domain name and as little as $5 a month for web
hosting. That’s the bare minimum. You can spend less than $500 in total to hire a web
designer for your mini-site, a cover artist for your e-book or your other digital products.
Throw in an extra $99 for a one-time fee to get an awesome piece of software like
AutoResponderPlus and you’re in great shape. All for under $500. That’s it. My last
project (an e-book) cost me $352 in total to set up, not including my PPC campaign. I made
it back in the first hour of the official launch of the product.
Low Overhead – And beyond those initial startup costs for getting set up and for creating
your product, you have very little ongoing monthly costs. You’re looking at a minimum of
$24.95 a month for a budget set-up that includes web hosting and your Internet connection
to a maximum of around $50 a month if you’re looking to keep expenses really low. If your
business takes off, you can always decide to invest more.
Your Home Office and No Employees – It should be obvious by now, but just in case
you didn’t catch it, you don’t need any fancy office out of which to run your information
empire. You can manage the entire business from the comforts of your home. Notice I said
“you” and only you. When you have an Internet business like the kind I’m going to show you
how to set up, you don’t need any employees. That’s right, you can operate literally on
autopilot. Autopilot? Yes, on autopilot.
Autopilot Riches – It’s not hard to invest a little time on the front end and spend a little
money to get your business up and running, then put it on autopilot. As you’ll soon learn,
the majority of what you’re going to be doing on a daily basis is answering your e-mail and
sending out e-mails to potential joint venture partners. Everything else, from selling and
promoting your product, to processing your customer’s credit cards, to delivering the
product, to sending out your newsletter and followup messages can be set up once and you
can forget about it. You only have to monitor your systems every so often to make sure
everything is running smoothly. Your business will literally be on autopilot and that’s very
cool. Very cool indeed!
Obscenely High Margins – And lastly, (just in order, not in terms of importance),
information products have very high margins. What’s high? Try as high as 95% to 99% if
you’re handling the payment processing and product delivery yourself. If you let someone
like Clickbank handle the fulfillment of your digital products, you’re just north of 90%.
WOW! You don’t find those type of margins in the physical world where you’ve got
companies struggling to achieve 8% margins.
The profit margin is so critical because the more you make per sale, the less you have to sell
to make the same kind of money in the physical world. So if you’re making $7 on a book
you self-published and are selling on Amazon.com, you’d have to sell roughly 6 of them to
match one e-book sale at $47 a pop (after paying fees, etc.). Now that’s pretty cool. Find
one customer instead of 6.
Global Marketplace – One of the most overlooked reasons to get into the information
products business, especially electronic products, is that thanks to the power of the
Internet, you can market and sell your products to the world. And thanks to the Internet,
it’s not going to cost you thousands of dollars to market your product to someone halfway
around the world. In fact, it costs you the same amount of money to market your products
to that person as it does to market your products to the person who lives next door to you.
The Odds are in YOUR Favor
Can you see why the odds are in your favor with information products? You have low entry
costs, low overhead, no employees, the ability to run your business on autopilot, some
obscenely high margins and the ability to market your product to the world for pennies on
the dollar!
Preparing for Success
There are a lot of steps involved in creating a best-selling niche product. If you’re not
organized, your not going to be successful. Before you begin brainstorming product ideas
and writing anything, take the time to clear off your desk and get your hands on some
critical resources.
Your Idea Journal
One of the cheapest and easiest ways to get organized is to go out and buy a plain 2” binder.
If you use this binder and you include some dividers, it’s easy to keep everything in one
place. You can print off the checklist in the back of this e-book, punch holes in it and place
it in your binder. Now you have a “hit” list of things you need to do and you know in what
order you need to do them.
Any time you come across a great article or you think of an idea that should go into your ebook, book or software product, jot it down and stick that paper into your binder. Having
an idea journal is a critical factor in being able to churn out many, many products over the
years. Why? Because the moment an idea strikes you, you can write it down so you don’t
forget it.
Don’t censor your journal entries. You don’t want to be thinking “can this idea become a
product” every time you think up something. Forget going through a “feasibility test” every
time an idea pops into your head. Instead, strive to record your experiences, observations
and any ideas you think up. Add a little flavor or commentary to each journal entry. By this
I mean you should write down what you’ve learned from an experience or key headlines for
a product idea. These items will help you come up with benefit statements and allow you to
profit from your experiences – good or bad. You’ll go through your journal at a later date
and worry about creating a product a product after you’ve finished your current project.
And that brings up a good point. By writing your ideas down and not acting on them right
away, you don’t lose focus on the project you’re currently working on. Let me explain.
The Idea Avalanche
My mentor and good friend Mike Litman coined a term for the pesky habit that
entrepreneurs have of coming up with too many product ideas. He calls it the idea
avalanche. You suffer from the idea avalanche if you think of an idea and immediately rush
out to research it, start the creation process and then…
You do nothing with the project after 7 to 10 days.
Then you’re in the shower and suddenly you think up another brilliant idea. You rush onto
the Internet and you go to your favorite discussion forum to talk passionately about your
great idea and how you think the market for your product is huge. In fact it’s enormous. So
you brainstorm product names and titles and you check out www.Register.com to see if
your choice domain name is available.
Then you start pricing your product and soon you’re counting the money you’re going to
make. Maybe you contact a partner because you need help. For 7 to 10 days you’re rocking
and rolling…then life takes hold and you get caught up in the day-to-day tasks of life.
Do you see where I’m going with this? When you suffer from the Idea Avalanche
you have TOO MANY ideas that force you not to FOCUS on one good idea. In
fact, that word FOCUS is so critical to your success in being able to use this manual to it’s
fullest.
If you don’t focus, you’re never going to be able to create your first, let alone your tenth
information product.
Don’t get me wrong, it’s okay to brainstorm on a consistent basis and create new product
ideas on a daily basis. But you’ve got to pull out your Idea Journal and “table” those ideas
for another day. I actually do major brainstorming sessions on Fridays and Sundays, but
I’m thinking about new products (profit centers) all the time. But pack to our line of
thought, for how long will you postpone working on the idea?
You must not work on any new ideas until you get that first project done and out of the way.
Again, there’s a reason why I urge my clients to focus on their first e-book or book first and
knock it out as fast as possible before they move on to the next project. If they don’t focus,
they don’t finish their original project and they get in that endless carousel of coming up
with great ideas, doing something with it for a few days or weeks, then moving on to the
next great idea and never getting off the carousel and bringing the product to market.
The One Caveat
You CAN start focusing on more than one project at a time when you have proven to
yourself that you can create products. If you have that first eB00k or product under your
belt, then you know that you can do it. You know how long it took you to do. You know
how much time and effort is involved. You can then better allocate your time to working on
each project and ensure that you’re going to finish all your projects. Okay, enough talking
about what you’re going to do. Let’s talk about the steps you’re going to take.
The Steps You Will Take in Your Journey
So exactly what is in store for you over the next few days and weeks? Below is just a quick
list of the steps that you’re going to be taking to go from putting your idea on paper and
creating a product out of it. We’ll be covering each step in detail in this manual.
Step #1 – Find Your Starving Crowd
Step #2 – Ask Them What They Want
Step #2a – QuickStormTM and Test Your Product Ideas (incl. pricing and USP)
Step #3 – Give It To Them
Step #3a – Pick a Sexy Title
Step #3b – Get Your Domain Name and Web-Site Hosting
Step #3c – Create Your System or Solution
Step #3d – Create Your Product (i.e., give it to them!)
Step #3e – Polish Your Product
Step #3f – Get Your Cover and Graphics for Your Killer Web-Site
Step #4 – Create Your Offer
Step #4a – Plan Your Backend
Step #4b – Create Your Bonus Pile On
Step #4c – Create Your Offer (incl. 9 Words that Will Lead to Millions)
Step #5 – Get Testimonials and Line Up Your Joint Venture Partners
Step #6 – Write Your Killer Sales Letter
Step #7 – Develop Your Web-Site (incl. Exit Pop-Ups and Autoresponders)
Step #7a – Develop Traffic Builders
Step #8 – Develop Your Backend Products (Optional, but Recommended)
Step #9 – Test Your Site and Go LIVE!
Step #9a – Promote the Product
Step #9b – Build Your Army (of Affiliates)
Step #9c – Making Backend Sales
Step #10 – Maintenance Mode & Fixing the Kinks (Profiting While You Sleep)
Step #11 – Repeat Steps #1 through #20 (And Do Them Often)
In reality, the steps boil down to three main steps (#1 - #3):
3-Step Process to Instant Riches
•
Find a starving crowd
•
Find out what they want
•
Give it to them
Give your starving crowd what they want in a simple, easy-to-understand language and
you’ll soon have an information empire in your hands. If you remember nothing else from
this manual, remember the three above critical steps and vow never to break them. So now
let’s get into step one…
21 Steps to 11 Steps?
A Note on the 11 steps I just mentioned. Originally I had 21 or 22 steps for you to follow,
but then realized that it was a bit ridiculous, so I cut them down and created mini-steps or
action steps that you’re going to take during each of the steps. I’ve done my best to go
through this manual and make sure I changed all the steps and entered the right numbers
and titles, but I might have missed a few. I’m sure you’re not going to mind because you’re
more concerned with creating products quickly and making money than whether step #9a
on page 192 should be step #7a as referenced earlier.
Again, I’ve done my best to fix the step numbers, but if you catch any redundancies or
issues, just drop me an email and let me know. I’ll be sure to reward you for reaching out.
[email protected]
Okay, with that caveat aside, let’s move into Step #1 right now!
S
tep ##1
1 –– FFind
ind Y
our S
tarving C
rowd
Step
Your
Starving
Crowd
“You see, this is one of the first things you need to do: you need to research your
market and find out where your market is online. But before even all this you
have to have a niche market. If you don’t have a niche market, you need to stop
right now because that’s what you need to do first. Find a niche market; don’t tell
me that our niche market is anyone that is online. Because if your niche market
is everyone that’s online, you’re probably not going to sell anything. The smaller
the niche, the better the niche. It’s better to be a big fish in a small pond. If
you can understand that, it makes a lot of sense. Find out where your market is
and go there; very simple.”
- Armand Morin, Audio Generator
Target Market First, Product Second
Before we get ahead of ourselves and start talking about developing your runaway hit
product, you need to first determine who you’re going to target. Most people get the
process backwards. They create a product first, then go out and try to market it. That’s not
the smartest thing to do, because regardless of how great your product is, if there’s no
market for it, there’s no dollars for you!
That’s why it’s critical for you to find your target market first, find out what they need and
give it to them. If you do these three things, you will have a runaway bestseller on your
hands.
Okay, so you know that you have to find your target market first, but how do you find it?
You locate your target market through a process of answering a few key questions.
1. What am I passionate about and do I love talking about?
2. Is there a market for selling information to my target market?
3. What are the major problems and needs of my target that I can solve?
Question #1 - What am I Passionate about and do I Love talking about?
This first question is critical. If you’re passionate about something, you’re going to find that
it’s going to be easy to write about. More importantly, you’re going to stay the course and
continued to be motivated by. The trouble with most would-be infopreneurs is that they
have a ton of great ideas, but staying focused and enthusiastic about the project is difficult.
When you love your subject matter, it’s not going to feel like a chore.
So how do you figure out what to write about or create a product around?
Simple. Answer this question:
“What do I talk about most frequently?”
•
•
•
•
Is it your hobby?
Is it your job?
Is it your part-time job?
Is it your _____________?
The point is that we all have SOMETHING that we love talking about and that means we’re
probably very PASSIONATE about. If you asked any of my friends what I would most likely
start a conversation about it would be personal finance, personal development, golf or
personal finance. NO, that’s not a typo. I’m very passionate about personal finance and it’s
no wonder that my first three information products were centered around personal finance
and helping others achieve financial abundance in their lives.
So What Do You Talk Most Frequently About?
•
•
•
____________________________
____________________________
____________________________
To come up with the idea or the topic of your product, you can answer one of several
questions:
How can I show people how to make money with _______________?
How can I save people money by/with __________________?
I can help people save time by __________________?
What’s the lazy way to __________________?
What do I wish I knew before I started ___________________?
Answer those questions and you’ll begin to hone in on the key aspects of your niche that
people will want to know, learn and either save money from using your information or make
money from it. Again, when you’re passionate about something, you’re going to be able to
quickly create a product for that niche because you probably already know 90% of what you
need to know to create the product.
"Success is doing what you love, loving what you do, and helping others to
learn how to do the same."
- Bob Burg
But can you really sell a product on knitting, needlepoint or breaking 100 on the golf
course? Of course you can, which brings us to our next question: Is there a market for
selling information to my target market?
Side Note: Frank Kern made headlines recently. He’s a great infopreneur and I’ve learned
a lot from him, so when he speaks, I listen. The reason Frank made headlines is that he said
that you don’t need to be passionate about your niche in order to profit. You can just find a
starving crowd, hire a ghostwriter like Frank does and market the heck out of the product.
Guess what? Frank is right. You CAN create a niche product that you don’t give a #$%#%
about, but for me personally, I find that I enjoy the process more when I’m writing about
something I love. In the end, it’s up to you to decide which route you take. I just thought
you should know both sides of the fence.
Are There Any Buyers in My Niche?
The truth is that every niche out there has buyers. Every hobby needs supplies that are
needed and books to help educate the hobbyists.
When you’re passionate about something and want to get better at it, you’re going to spend
hundreds if not thousands of dollars per year on your passion.
When I took up the guitar in college, I went out and bought several magazines per week on
the subject. Then it was music books and then it was new audio equipment and so on and
so on. I spent over $3,000 one summer on guitar “stuff” and that was just one summer.
A few years later I got into golf and I spent money on everything from golf clubs to books on
golf to videos to improve my swing to golf lessons to tokens at the driving range. If I knew
about e-books back then I’d probably have bought an e-book or six to help me lower my golf
score. Clearly there’s a market for selling information products to golfers and the market is
very HUGE!
Some niches are smaller, but that doesn’t mean you can’t make good money selling
information products to them. There’s a guy on the Internet who’s making over $100,000 a
year selling information on how to make wire jewelry. Then he expanded to start selling the
materials to create the wire jewelry and he instantly had another revenue source.
Online and Reachable
Another important factor in deciding whether to create a product for a target market is
whether or not your potential buyers are online and whether you can reach them. You’ve
got to find a target market that you can reach via your web-site or at minimum e-mail in
order to have a viable target to sell stuff to. I hope that makes sense.
How do you find out if there are groups online and they’re reachable?
Well, chances are if it’s your hobby or your passion, you belong to a few discussion forums
and you know all the web-sites where these people would visit. I’ll show you how to find out
these two points in just a moment, but I want to get to our last question: What are the
major problems and needs of my target that I can solve?
Super Tip/Resource– www.GettingTraffic.com & www.Groups.Google.com
This site will list all the big discussion forums out there for internet marketers. You can
learn a lot just by visiting the top ones and learning from the pros as they discuss what’s hot
and what’s not in thousands of different niches.
Become a Problem Solver
The key to instant riches in this information selling game is to identify a large target market
that’s reachable and sell them something that will solve one of their major problems in life.
Every successful e-book, tape set, home study course or bootcamp out there is based on
solving a major problem people have or fulfilling a major need. People will spend big
money to lose weight, improve their golf score, get ahead on the job, save their marriage
and make millions online.
Why?
Because these problems and needs are HUGE for them. They’re the type of problems and
needs that take over and control their lives. They want quick fixes to ease their pain or give
them more pleasure. Your job is to find the problems and provide the solutions. Make
sense?
Again, identify your target market’s BIGGEST PROBLEMS and provide
SOLUTIONS to those problems and you’ll have a runaway best-seller on your hands
(and a fat bank account as well)!
Why?
Because hen you tap into a group’s emotions and you create a product based on solving
their problems, the selling process becomes that much easier. They’re desperate to find a
solution to their problem, so when you start with your target market’s needs and desires
and you know what their major problem is that they want solved, the creation of
information products and your sales copy for that matter is a very simple process.
But how do you find out what their major PROBLEMS are? You ask them. Yes, it’s that
simple. Whether you’re looking to write a book or an e-book or create a seminar, you can
speed up the process just by finding your market first, asking them what they want, and
then giving it to them. We’ll talk more about this three-step process involved in asking and
creating your product in a moment, but let’s move on to figuring out what the major
problems people have and how we can relate them back to your passion and your niche.
Evaluating Your Niche
It’s not hard to find your market these days thanks to the Internet. It used to be that you’d
have to pay thousands of dollars for information on demographics, psychographics, and a
whole bunch of other stuff we barely understand. Nowadays, you can do a quick search
using a tool such as, www.goodkeywords.com, and find out how often people are searching
for certain keywords or topics on the internet. You can also do a search on
www.Google.com and see what terms are used most often, etc. A little more advanced tool
can be found at www.WordTracker.com. They compile a database of terms that people
search for. You enter some keywords, and we tell you how often people search for them,
and also tell you how many competing sites use those keywords. This information
can be helpful to see just how much competition you have out there.
Once you find a keyword or two that has good traffic, you go to www.Google.com, enter in
the search term, and see what pops up. You can tell if there are a number of web sites
dedicated to your topic, how many active members are participating in the discussion
forums, and so on. Later on, we’re going to talk about how to dig even deeper into the nuts
and bolts of finding your target audience and marketing your products to these people.
Some Common Niches and Topics People Write About:
Here’s just a partial list of topics that people write about and have proven to be very
lucrative:
Dieting
Home Improvements
Cooking
Self-Confidence and Self-Esteem
Golf
Personal Development
Sex
Dealing with Old Age/Illness
How to Make More Money
To Get Healthier
How to Save Money
Find Relationship/Perfect Soul Mate
Get Out of Debt
Overcome Procrastination
Invest Our Money
Politics
Real Estate Investing
Religion
Save More Time
Music
How to Take the Easy Route or Way Out
Cats
Make Work Easier
Dogs
Sleep Better
Pet Training
And on the Internet:
Start Your Own Internet Business
Affiliate Marketing
Make More Money Doing Nothing
Create Your Own Products
Online Auctions, especially eBay
Mastering Google and PPCs
Some of these topics and niches are pretty crowded. Things like ‘How to Make Money on
the Internet’ and ‘Make Money through Affiliate Programs’ are pretty crowded right now,
but that doesn’t mean that you couldn’t come along with a blockbuster product like Shawn
Casey did. You just have to have your own unique twist on the subject to make it big. Or
you can just mix and match topics.
Mix and Match
A great way to put your unique twist on a topic is to combine a topic with another one. For
instance, “How to Make Money with Your Hobby” is a popular theme. How about an e-book
teaching people how to write their own e-book (create your own products) so they can make
money selling it (make more money).
Hmmm. Sounds familiar. My wife teases me about it all the time. Hopefully you’ll help me
get the last laugh by showing me the fat checks you got from your work of art. But I
digress…
There are three components to a good niche:
•
•
•
It already exists
It’s easy to identify
It’s easy to target prospects
That’s what the standard marketing books and e-books out there will tell you. But there is
one important thing you need to do first before you start developing products and targeting
prospects.
I learned the importance of this “must do” task from master copywriter Gary Halbert. Of
course Gary being Gary isn’t going to come right out and tell you what it is. He first gives
you a hypothetical story and makes you come to the conclusion yourself. Here’s the story he
tells you…
Your Hamburger Stand vs. Gary’s Hamburger Stand
The story goes something like this. Gary stands up at his seminars and asks:
“If you and I both owned a hamburger stand and we were in a contest to sell the most
hamburgers, what advantages would you most like to have on your side?”
As you can imagine, everyone in the audience begins shouting out various answers.
Everything from a bigger marketing budget to a celebrity endorsement to the better
location. So Gary tells the crowd he’ll gladly grant everyone their wish as long as they give
him the one advantage he wants the most. What’s the ONLY advantage Gary wants?
Take one guess…
“A STARVING Crowd”
That’s it. That’s all that Gary wants and it’s all that you should want. Why? Let me explain
why as quickly as possible.
Forget hamburger stands for a moment. When it comes to an online business, Gary doesn’t
care if you’ve got a better web-site, better copy, or even a better product. He wants a
starving crowd that’s hungry for information and he’s going to be kind enough to give it to
them. Shouldn’t you operate from the same mindset?
Find your starving crowd first, then go to work on your product. Period. End of story.
Never forget this lesson. So that’s the right order of things to do. Find the market first,
then create the product. If you create the product first and then try to market the
product to the niche, you’re going to fail every time. It’s guaranteed.
You need to first research and understand the needs of the target market, find out their
major problems and/or concerns – and create a product or service that solves their
problems.
What and Where is Your Starving Crowd?
Do NOT waste your time writing a book or creating a product unless you know who your
customers are BEFORE you waste your time and money on an idea that has no market. We
get contacted all the time by writers and product creators who want help promoting and
marketing their stuff, but they have no idea who will buy it or how it will solve their target
market’s problems.
While the two of us have worked overtime to take loser products, repackage them, rebrand
them, and remarket them for successful results, it’s much easier to start with your target
market first, THEN create the product to fill their needs.
Most wannabe marketers out there spend way too many weeks and months creating
products that nobody wants and then they try and force them on people. They’ve got it all
wrong. They’re trying to build a massive opt-in list that’s not targeted because they think
bigger is better. Well it’s not; targeted is better. Much, much better when it comes to
making some real cash online.
Okay, back to your hamburger stand. You’ve got a starving crowd beating down your door.
What do you do? You make like a waiter and you ask them what they want to eat. That’s it.
That’s all you have to do to put the wheels of success in motion. Once you’ve got their order,
you run back to your computer…er, the kitchen and cook up the product…I mean the meal
they want. Then you serve it to them as fast as possible and you make it as easy as possible
for them to digest it (learn the material). Of course you’ve got to make it easy for them to
pay for it.
So back to reality. You’ve picked out a niche with a starving market. The next step is to find
out what information they want and are willing to pay money for. You’ve got to act like the
waiter and ask your starving crowd what they want to buy from you. How do you do that?
Easy. You do a couple of hours worth of research.
“Research? Yuck!”
Relax. You don’t have to do much more than what you’re currently doing on a daily basis,
mainly surfing the web and visiting a few sites that you’re probably interested in anyway.
The Importance of Market Research
Most would-be experts who fail miserably immediately think of a niche and jump in without
doing their homework. It’s not enough to pick a niche and start advertising like crazy. You
fist have to do some research to analyze the market, your competition, the current products
and services that are available, and most importantly you have to really get to know and
understand your target customers needs and desires.
Yes, this isn’t the fun stuff, but if you don’t do the upfront work, you could be wasting your
time and money. So please, please, please take the time to read through this section on
market research and do your homework. I’m not taking any excuses because we want to see
you succeed.
"Men give me credit for some genius. All the genius I have is this: When I
have a subject in mind, I study it profoundly. Day and night it is before
me. My mind becomes pervaded with it. The effort which I have made is
what people are pleased to call the fruit of genius. It is the fruit of labor
and thought."
- Alexander Hamilton
Market research will help “round out” your own knowledge of your customers, their needs,
as well as where your industry is headed in the coming years. You’re going to be gathering
information from trade magazines and web-sites, the newspaper, and even government
data sources. This will give you a broad insight into your target market and consumer. I
consider this behind the scenes work to be passive research. Then there’s active
research where you actively get out in front of your target customer and talk to them
directly and find out what their needs and desires are. You can reach them through
industry gatherings, seminars, online forums, and chat groups. How do you find the various
sites? Google.com is my first stop.
Using Google
You can do a search on www.Google.com under a list of key search words that relate to your
niche and industry. See how many web-sites are found by looking at the bottom of the page
on Google.com. Then you should spend some time surfing those sites. Are they selling
anything? How do you figure that out? Well, it’s not always easy, but one way to tell if the
site is getting some serious traffic is to use the Alexa toolbar, which is a very important tool
to have.
Use Alexa
Another great tool to see how well trafficked (big) these sites are is to check out their
ranking using the Alexa.com toolbar. The toolbar is free to download and it simply takes a
look at the traffic patterns on the Internet and ranks the web-sites based on their traffic and
who is linking to those sites. The more traffic and links, the higher their ranking.
Subscribe to their newsletters and read through their blogs and/or discussion forums.
Doing this research might seem like it’s time consuming and tedious, but it’s going to pay
off big time when it comes time to create your product. You’ll know what the hot topics are
and what gets discussed most often. You’ll have a better understanding of your target
market and more importantly, their major problems and concerns.
Lazy? Here are Some Killer Categories to Go After
Okay, so you know that you can go to Google.com or visit the bestseller list at Clickbank to
come up with niche markets that have great potential, but you’re lazy. Okay, I hear you, I
know what it’s like to want to quickly jump through the steps and cash some checks. So
here’s a partial list of some topics that ALWAYS have a starving crowd. Please note, that
these are BROAD topics and in order to make them into a winner, you’re going to have to
break them down and find a niche within them.
#1 – Making Money
Remember that annoying commercial with what’s her name screaming: “Do you want to
make more money?” Sure, we all do, right? Well then it should come as no surprise that
there is a HUGE market out there for products, services and information on how people can
make more money. Whether it be through a part-time business www.CashMoreChecks.com
or finding free information online and selling it for some big money (see: Public Domain
Riches), people go nuts over this type of information.
#2 – Dieting and Weight Loss
Obesity is not just a concern in the US, but globally. Add on top of that the fact that people
want to look better for themselves and for the man or woman they’re trying to attract and
you’ve got a recipe for a hot market. Pick your niche in this broad market, i.e. low carb
diets, high carb diets, 10-minute workouts, no sweat workouts…you name it and profit like
crazy.
This market has seen a huge explosion of late thanks to the low carb craze and the increased
focus on childhood obesity. Billions of dollars a year are spent by consumers looking for
that quick fix.
Maybe your product will be the next big thing!
#3 – Personal Development and Self-Help
Tony Robbins, Brian Tracy, Jim Rohn and [insert your favorite guru’s name] have become
household names thanks to their information products. They’ve got CDs, bootcamps,
seminars, tape sets, books, videos and so on. I’ve got a shelf full of books and tape sets in
this area because I’m just like everyone else out there. I’m looking to improve myself and
get more out of life.
If you can show people a way to improve their lives and get more out of their days and their
life, you’re going to be rich.
#4 – Relationships
Whether it’s about finding that person to spend the rest of your life with, making yourself
more attractive, or getting rid of your current mate, relationships is a very emotional and
important area of our lives. And you should already realize that if something is both
emotional and important to someone, they’re going to pay for information to help them in
this area of their life. Make that they’re going to pay A LOT for information to help them.
This is an arena that has many, many different niches. You could talk about divorce,
flirting, courting, first dates, sex, how to be more romantic, how to be a better parent, how
to be a better lover, how to communicate better, patching up a relationship, how to be less
controlling and so on. I literally could fill up 1001 different topics in this area alone and
they’d all be bestsellers.
If you’re interested in this topic/area, then all you have to do is make sure you’re targeted
enough and come up with a sexy title. More on this in a moment.
#5 – Hobbies
95% of people have hobbies (for the other 5%, their work is probably their hobby) so it’s no
wonder that this would make a great topic to explore. Stroll into your local bookstore and
you’ll see hundreds of books on needlepoint, trains, running, woodworking, golf and so on.
People spend thousands of dollars every year on their hobbies and there’s no reason why
your product couldn’t be one of the ones they buy. Whether you create a physical product
they use with their hobby or you provide them information about how to do it or enjoy their
hobby more, it doesn’t matter. Find out what they want and give it to them.
Is it really that simple?
There’s a guy who’s made millions online selling information on how to make and sell wire
jewelry. If he can do it, don’t you think you can create a best-selling infoproduct on your
love of [insert your hobby here]? Of course you can.
#6 – Save Money and/or Avoid Being Ripped Off
You can market thousands of products under this broad topic. Anything from 1001 Ways to
Stretch Your Paycheck to How to Sell Your Home without an Agent to Do-It-Yourself
Haircut Handbook to Don’t Let Your Mechanic Rip You Off! Don’t laugh. One guy I
interviewed wrote an e-book called how not to be ripped off by your auto mechanic and he’s
sold hundreds upon hundreds of copies. People love to save money and no one wants to be
taken advantage of and you can profit big time by giving them the information they want.
#7 – Do Something Easier, Faster or Better
This is kind of smorgasbord of topics, but it’s an important one, especially when you’re able
to break down a topic and make it easy for people to understand. This is the foundation
behind the mult-million dollar “Idiots Guide” and “For Dummies” franchises.
This is the section where I lump in the topics of Saving Time and doing things with Less
Effort. They could really be their own categories, but I wanted to make things as broad as
possible. This way you find your starving crowd, ask them what they want and then see if
you can create a product idea that fits into one of these categories.
Now if you recall from earlier, I said that there were three main steps to being a successful
infopreneur. The next step is to…
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“Oh, my friends, if you will just take only four blocks around you, and find
out what the people want and what you ought to supply and set them down
with your pencil, and figure up the profits you would make if you did
supply them, you would very soon see it. There is wealth right in the
sound of your voice.”
- Russell Conwell, Author of Acres of Diamonds
So you’ve found a potentially lucrative niche and a starving crowd. It’s time to find out what
they want.
Survey Says?
There couldn’t be an easier way to find out what your market wants than to simply ask
them directly through a survey. Up until a few months ago, setting up a survey involved
creating a form on your web-site and getting people to go to your site to fill it out.
Nowadays there are a lot more options to create survey using online tools that are cheap
(read: FREE) and easy to use. Here are a few surveying tools you can use:
www.SurveyMonkey.com
www.Zoomerang.com
www.WebSurveyor.com
Now you don’t have to create anything fancy. You’re just looking to create a simple 3 to 5
question survey to send to your customers or potential customers. You should make the
questions easy to answer which means multiple choice questions. Multiple choice questions
work best because it involves a lot less time and effort on your respondents’ part.
Have a Clear Set of Goals
You always want to know what you want to get out of anything that you do not only on the
Internet, but in life. When you’re testing a new product idea, you’ve got to have a clear set
of goals that you want to achieve by sending out the survey. Perhaps you’re looking for
direction as to which product idea to go with because you have too many that you could
create. Perhaps you’re testing to see what price point would work. Maybe you’re looking to
see if there is a market for the product among the members of your list.
Before I create my list of questions, I like to write down exactly what I want to get out of the
survey. In short, I write down the information that I want to glean from the respondents.
Then I write several questions per information goal and narrow it down to the top one or
two questions per information goal. You should strive to write both open-ended and closedended questions. An open ended question is a fill in the blank type questions, whereas the
closed question is a true or false, yes or no, or multiple choice with the answers shown type
question. The reason you do both is to mix it up and to give people a chance to speak their
mind if they don’t find a response they like. Generally I use close-ended questions for
figuring out my price points and titles, but I generally say that if they have an alternate title
they like better, to fill it in.
Before sending off the questions, I test the survey with my mastermind group. They
generally pick it apart and add some questions and revise others. Then I send it off to my
list once it’s ready and sit back and wait for the responses to come in. If I use a service like
SurveyMonkey.com, I can log in and get the stats immediately. If the questions are mostly
multiple choice, it’s not too difficult to see the patterns emerging from the responses and
see what titles and price points are winning.
Instantly you’ll be able to see what products your subscribers are willing to buy from you. If
you don’t currently have a subscriber list…GET ONE! Just kidding, well kind of. If you
don’t have a list you can always post the link on a forum and tell people to fill out the survey
to help you out. Of course regardless of whether you’re posting on a forum or sending it to
your list, you should always offer some sort of bonus. Bonus?
Give them some sort of bonus for filling out your survey. This helps to improve the number
of respondents you get for each survey you send out. It doesn’t have to be something
extravagant. Maybe it’s a free report on a hot subject or maybe a free e-book that you’ve
branded with your affiliate links.
Other Ways to Ask Them
While surveys are the best way if you’ve got a list and an established ezine already, what do
you do if you’re starting from scratch? You head to discussion forums.
"There are reasons some businesses are hugely successful, others "get by" and the
less fortunate fail. From a marketing perspective it seems quite simple: You must
know your customers and what it takes to make them happy."
-Bruce Johnson
Mandatory Assignment – Reading Magazines and Visiting Web-Sites
I believe that every good infopreneur should read industry trade magazines and visit
relevant web-sites within their areas of expertise. But the truly great infopreneurs are also
in tune with pop and mass culture. They know what the latest buzz is and what’s cool and
what’s not. It’s not because they’re out there clubbing with Paris Hilton or hitting the New
York dance club scene. It’s because they’re tuned into MTV every so often and reading
magazines like People, Fast Company, Inc, and reading the USA Today. Whether these
magazines and newspapers or other media are the right ones for you is not for debate here.
What I’m getting at is that you should spend some time during the week for keeping in
touch with the rest of society. I think too many infopreneurs, especially Internet
infopreneurs have a tendency to be short-sighted and not have a broad range of
experiences. You want to be in tune with what’s going on in the world, not just because you
can use the information to create products from emerging trends. You want to be able to
connect with people and you do that through knowing what’s hot and what’s not. You
connect by telling stories that are ripped from the headlines of major newspapers and TV
programs. It all gets back to telling stories. I’ll talk about it over and over again. Some of
the best speakers are able to tell a story that instantly encapsulates (how’s that for a $10
word!) what it is that you are trying to say in four or five chapters. Use the media as a
resource for your future products and for stories you’ll one day tell from a stage.
I urge you to create a short list of magazines, newspapers and web-sites that you will read
and frequent to learn about what’s going on in the world. When you can talk intelligently
about developments inside and outside your industry, you’ll quickly be perceived as an
expert. In what niche, that’s up to you to decide. Again, you will find issues that are hot
and that can be turned into a killer product just by monitoring your conversations and by
reading People or Maxim or Rolling Stone or Fast Company or visiting MSN.com or
AOL.com chat rooms. Just do it and get out there and fill your brain with something other
than the perfect way to write a sales letter and the perfect sequence for your autoresponder.
Oh, one last thing. Make sure you read the letters to the editors section of the newspapers
and magazines. This section is great for coming up with hot topics that people are
passionate enough to write to someone in authority about. You will be amazed at how many
great ideas, tips, techniques and product concepts that you can create just by reading the
daily column of letters that are sent to the editors. The whole process will take 5 to 10
minutes tops and will give you several great product ideas per week! It’s that powerful of a
column because it’s direct customer feedback.
One More Super Tip – Set Time Aside to Think
You would think (pun intended) that people would set aside more time to think about new
products, marketing, selling, their customers and other important stuff because it’s so
critical to their success…but they don’t. Most people tend to get caught up in their day-today work and never really think about new product ideas or how to make their products
better. I want you to make sure that you plan on setting aside some time each day to think
up new product ideas. It could be 15 minutes before you start work or 20 minutes before
bed time, just do it. Sit there with a pad and pen and jot down whatever comes to mind. If
you’re having problems thinking, just pull out one of the magazines you’re going to be
reading every month and skim through it.
Do you see any product ideas? Are there any big problems that people are talking about?
What are the issues that keep popping up day after day? Did you read about something that
you can apply to your business? Think, get outside the box, be silly, be outrageous. THINK!
Then write it down. Don’t judge what you write and don’t cross anything out. You’ll be
visiting your idea journal later on and you never know what idea that you once cast aside
will come around and become a best-selling idea for you.
So we’ve covered the first two important steps in the process of becoming a successful
infopreneur. Before we get to the third step (giving them what they want), we have to find
out if our product concept is valid or not.
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QuickStormingTM Your Product
Once you’ve done your homework and found out what your starving market wants, you’ve
got to quickly come up with some product ideas. Write down what your product would talk
about, what problems it would solve and just about everything else that comes to your mind
about what you’re going to include in the product. This list of “stuff” that you want to cover
will eventually become your detailed outline that you will use to create your product. But
don’t waste your time creating a detailed outline just yet. More on this in a second.
I call the process of quickly coming up with product ideas QuickStormingTM. The process is
really simple and you can do it alone or in a group.
•
•
•
•
•
Clear your desk or table of any clutter and pull out some pieces of blank copy paper.
The idea is to limit your distractions and focus on the main task: coming up with
product ideas
Write your end goal at the top of the first piece of paper. For instance, “A step-by-step
manual that will teach people how to create niche products on demand.” This one
sentence phrase is the goal of your QuickStormingTM session and will help keep you
focused as you brainstorm and ideate.
Write down EVERY idea or thought that pops into your head. DO NOT evaluate the
idea, title or subject of anything you think of. Regardless of how ridiculous an idea
might seem at first glance, you never know how easily you can turn it into a profitable
product down the line.
Limit your session to a set amount of time. You don’t want to be sitting there for hours
trying to think up a blockbuster product. I like to do my QuickStormingTM sessions for
15 minutes to 20 minutes at a time. This keep my mind fresh and at its peak.
Put all your ideas to the side before trying to evaluate whether any of them are viable or
not. Where do you write all of your ideas down? Your idea journal/binder, that’s where.
I told you it would be a critical tool to have an idea journal.
Another way to brainstorm ideas is to use mind mapping. Let’s get into how it works and
how you can use it to come up with some killer ideas for information products.
Mind Mapping
What I do during my sessions is often use a technique called Mind Mapping. It’s proven to
be a great technique to segment the ideas into different buckets or groupings of similar
products. Think of a spider web or the spokes on a bicycle. You have the main core and
then all the other little spokes that branch out to other “ideas” on the wheel. They all funnel
back to the main idea, but they can stand on their own as a great idea if they had to. Here’s
a quick rundown of how you do it:
•
•
•
•
•
Start in the middle of a blank piece of paper and write down the main idea you’re
working on.
Begin associating thoughts and ideas with this main idea and write them down under
the idea.
Whenever you think of an idea that’s outside this core concept, you draw a line to
another space on the page and create a new place for the idea. Under this new idea you
write any thoughts that come to mind under it.
Create multiple sub-lines or ideas.
See if you can link together the different ideas into a product. This serves to help make
your product targeted, but at the same time hitting several niches or need states at the
same time.
Just like with QuickStormingTM, you’re striving to just write without judging the ideas or
thoughts. You can then go over the Mind Map you’ve created and see if any of the ideas are
worth pursuing and testing. Now all of this might seem like hard work and it really isn’t,
but I know that some of you might be the lazy type (myself included), so you’re probably
looking for other ways to come up with great ideas. Luckily there are a few simple ways out
there to come up with product ideas.
Scan the Bestseller List
I frequently look at the top-sellers on Amazon.com in several categories that interest me.
Not to shop, but to brainstorm product ideas that I know my niche will want. Sometimes a
book’s title will capture my attention and lead me down a path to a different product. This
is how Jason Oman came up with the title Conversations with Millionaires. He was
in his room and thinking about the taped interviews his friend Mike Litman had done with
millionaire authors and speakers and Jason happened to glance at his bookshelf. There he
saw a book titled Conversations with God and the rest is history.
Do a Survey
I love surveys. Wait, I already told you that. You can actually use a survey to do both parts
of this step: develop product ideas AND test them out. Here’s what you do…
Send out a quick little note to your newsletter subscribers and say something to the effect
of:
“Hey everyone. Thanks for making [name of your last product] such a success. I’m about to
get ready to start work on another e-book and I don’t know what to write about, so I
thought I’d ask you. What topics would you like me to write about? What topic would you
pay to learn more about?”
Then you offer them a free gift, maybe a 5 page report, for replying to you.
You could also post your survey on your blog if you have one and/or your web-site.
SuperTip: Be on the lookout for survey results from institutions, magazines, newspapers
and beyond. I always write down anything interesting tidbits that I find in the areas that I
play in.
Improving an Existing Product
Terry Levine once wrote “Being an inventor is an expensive proposition. Be a
makeover artist. That is much easier to accomplish. In other words, find a market that
some companies are currently trying to reach. Then, figure out what mistakes they are
making...what the customers really want...and create a better mousetrap in the process.”
I simply love that above quote and it’s no wonder. Improving products is one of my favorite
ways of coming up with my own products. It can be argued that all my e-books except for
Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less! have a lot of competition. To a lesser extent,
Teleseminar Magic doesn’t have a lot of competition, but there are a few other
infoproducts out there that it competes with. But I mean how many e-books are there on
writing e-books and writing books? Tons and yet my two e-books The One Minute
eBook and Write It Fast! have cut through and become best-sellers because they had
sexy titles and have better than average sales letters. Oh, and they deliver…unlike some of
the other products they compete with.
The way I use this “Improve on an Existing Product” technique is I take a look at some of
my favorite books and e-books and I ask myself some questions:
! What do I hate about this product?
! What do I wish it did more of?
! What do I wish it did less of?
I write down my first reactions to the questions and then with my answers in hand, I start
shaping my product idea and the outline of a system that addresses the issues I have with
the other products on the market. Note, this is much easier to do with a physical product
versus an e-book or a book. For instance, if you’re using a vacuum cleaner and notices that
it’s always losing suction, you could go and create a vacuum cleaner that never loses suction.
This is exactly what that guy with the cool accent did for this pretty boring niche. He’s
made millions.
This is what Apple did with the iPod and what Krispy Kreme did with donuts. They took
products that were around for years and decades and transformed them into cool and hip
products. Yes, KK managed to make donuts hip and cool. When celebrities (Adam Sandler
and…well, my wife and I) are serving them at their weddings, you know you’ve done a great
job of creating great products.
To recap, you MUST find a product and improve it, focus in on a specific niche with the
product, then market the heck out of it and you’ll make millions. By the way, you don’t have
to spend millions to market the heck out of it. For more on how to create remarkable
products and market them, check out ANY book by Seth Godin, especially:
Unleashing the IdeaVirus
Purple Cow
Free Prize Inside
Watch TV
Yeah, like this is going to be a hard one to convince you to do! In all seriousness, when you
watch TV shows and you watch advertising, there are often bits of dialogue or product
pitches that are going to spark your creativity and help you create and further develop your
product idea. Why does this work? Well it works for two reasons.
One, the TV sitcoms and dramas always show what’s hot and the characters are the trend
setters for the rest of us. So if they’re using a product or talking about a niche, chances are
you can exploit it. Secondly, advertisers are spending millions on those ads so they test
their copy and of course they’ve got to be marketing to a big enough (and hungry enough)
market to spend that kind of crazy cash on a 30 second spot.
Discussion Forums
I hate repeating myself, especially in an e-book, but it’s worth repeating here. I love visiting
several discussion forums and just popping into various discussion threads. Most forum
owners have done me a tremendous favor by including a “hit” counter which tracks how
many people have opened a thread and how many posts there are. I just visit the most
popular threads and find out what all the fuss is about. Just like I did before, I pay
attention to words and phrases like:
I wish someone would……?
Is there a way that I can….…?
Anyone know where I can get…….?
And well, just about any other lead-in phrases that speak to needing something or wanting
something. One more. Be on the look out for responses from forum veterans who answer
with something to the effect of “That question has been asked hundreds of times
before. Just do a search on the forum for “[insert keyword].” When you hear or see that
phrase, your eyes should light up. I can’t tell you how many product ideas I’ve generated
just from that one phrase alone, but creating products out of the best ones will make me
rich. Perhaps they’ll make you rich as well. ☺
Your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
Your Unique Selling Proposition is a one-sentence statement of why you’re unique
and how your product or service instantly solves your customer’s key problem.
USPs help differentiate you from the crowd by emphasizing your strengths and exposing the
weaknesses of your competition. After all you’re the pizza place that guarantees fresh hot
pizza in 30 minutes, not Joe’s Pizza down the block. You’re the one who ships products that
have to absolutely positively be there overnight, not the other also-ran shipping company.
While these are examples of BIG businesses, they hold true for smaller and more
entrepreneurial businesses as well. It’s just that most small companies never even know the
secret behind a good USP and how it can transform their business…overnight.
Let me turn things over to our friend and marketing expert, Renee Kennedy who’s going to
teach you about Unique Selling Propositions and why they’re so critical to your success...
Your Unique Selling Proposition
By Renee Kennedy
www.thewritemarket.com
What is a unique selling proposition or USP? Very simply stated, your USP is what
differentiates your product from your competition's product.
What a USP looks like:
1. It's one sentence.
2. It is clearly written, so that anyone can understand it.
3. It should be believable.
4. It is composed of one benefit that is unique solely to your company or product
Develop a USP using one or more of the following strategies:
1. Focus on a niche. In other words, before you develop the USP, find your target market.
Who exactly are you selling to?
2. Fill a void. This is similar to finding a niche. Look for a void in the market and fill it with
your USP.
3. Concentrate on "pain" or "pleasure."
4. State how your product will solve a problem.
5. Look at your competition. (The next article is about how to look at your competition.)
6. Tell the customer what they are going to get - what's in it for them.
7. Make it "measurable." Time and price are measurable qualities.
More Tips:
1. Sit down with a piece of paper:
a) Brainstorm.
b) List all the benefits your company or product can offer.
c) Prioritize those benefits in order of what is the strongest, and most unique to your
business.
d) Write one sentence that conveys the first benefit on the list.
2. Every employee should know your USP and be able to state it. (Especially if you are a
small business.)
3. Your marketing campaigns, your marketing plan, and your business plan should
surround your USP.
20 Ways to Beat Your Competition
Make a list of products/services that compete with yours. Go to their web sites and compare
their offers to yours.
Some elements of comparison and sample USP's:
Delivery
Dominos Pizza, "Domino's delivers, 30 minute delivery or your money back."
Durability
Energizer, "Outlasts all other batteries.... It keeps going and going and going."
Performance/Efficiency
M&M's, "Melt in your mouth, not in your hand." (Well, that's a type of performance!)
Tide, "You bought a high efficiency washing machine... Why wouldn't you buy a high
efficiency detergent?"
What it's made out of
Ragu, "It's in there!" (I hated those Ragu commercials, but I sure do remember them.)
Provides feelings of self worth
NIKE, "Just do it."
Kia, "Who wouldn't be proud? Darn good cars. Darn good warranty." (Now that's my kinda
commercial.)
"Feelings of self worth" is one that you can really delve into. Go back to the article, Product
for more ideas:
Guarantee/Warranty
Midas Muffler, "Guaranteed for as long as you own your car."
Price
Walmart, "Rollback the prices."
Convenience or ease of use
7-11, "Open all night."
Dunkin Donuts, "Time to make the donuts..." impying that whenever you're ready for a
donut, the donuts will be ready for you.
Choice
Verizon, "Whatever you want, whatever you need."
JCPenney, "It's all inside."
Saves money
Geico, "A 15 minute call could save you 15% or more on car insurance."
Bonuses or Extras Here's an article on that one: 10 Free Bonuses That Can Ignite Your
Profits!
Process of making the product
Stouffers, "Nothing comes closer to home."
Burger King, "Flame broiled the way you like it."
(If you have a home made or handmade or personalized product, you can really develop a
strong USP.)
Customer Service
Burger King, "Have it your way." (This was an older Burger King USP)
The ONLY one
Paxil, "The only mediation proven effective for social anxiety disorder." (Can you tell I like to
watch the soaps?)
For the betterment of society
Phillip Morris, "Working to make a difference, the people of Phillip Morris." (This one really
irks me, should read, "Working to bring you lung cancer and liver disease..." but, I have to
give credit where credit is due, they are doing a heck of a job at re-branding.)
Expert's Choice
Metamusil, "The Doctor's natural choice."
Solves a problem
thingamajob.com, "Don't get lost in cyberspace. Life 2.0 starts here."
Dependability
First National Bank, "Here Today... Here Tomorrow... We have stood the Test of Time."
Maytag, "The dependability people."
Complementary Services
Are there other services that complement the main service that you are offering? (Full
Service or Service Added)
Targeting Service
We do one thing and we do it better than everyone else.
Some companies will take a few of the above and incorporate them into one strong USP.
For instance, Kia takes "feelings of self worth" and "guarantee/warranty" and
"dependability" and rolls them all into a bold USP.
If your competition is using one of the above, then you need to establish a USP that is
different than theirs, attack in a different way than your competition.
Out of the above 20 examples, has something struck you? Can you say that your company
does one or more of those things better than all of your competition? That's your USP.
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Thanks for the help Renee! If you want to learn more about USPs and positioning, hop on
over to www.thewritemarket.com
But for now, let’s talk about you as the “PROBLEM SOLVER.”
Benefits of Your Service: You Solve Problems
Beyond your USP, it’s also critical to have a short list of industry problems written out with
answers as to how your company or service solves those problems. Again, it goes back to
the Law of the Few or the Pareto Principle. 80 to 90 percent of the issues you’re going to
hear about will be traced back to 10 to 20 percent of the problems out there.
Getting rid of procrastination, gaining motivation/self-discipline, and creating a clear
action plan are the most common issues life coaches will face. Wouldn’t it be smart to know
how your service solves these issues so that when a client asks you if you can help them in
an area, instead of stammering and uttering a bunch of “uh’s” and “um’s” you can quickly
and clearly articulate EXACTLY HOW you will solve their problem.
Having a clearly defined USP and doing the work of answering the most common questions
ahead of time will put you above 95 percent of the competition.
Time to Test Your Ideas
Then you take these ideas and you go back to your market and you ask them if they’re
interested. If one or two ideas on your short list of product ideas are deemed “interesting”
by your market, then you’ve got yourself a potential best-selling product on your hands.
But how do you think up your product ideas? How do you take that big category/topic and
narrow it down into a more specific idea that you can then turn into a product? The process
of narrowing down your topic into a killer idea is done through a process of taking a look at
that list of problems you made, talking to your starving crowd and short bursts of
inspiration.
Will it be a Profitable Product?
You need to find out before hand if your product has “legs” and will sell. I hate it when one
of my coaching clients spend hours upon hours trying to find out if their product will work
in the marketplace. I tell them not to spend so much valuable time find out if 99.9% of the
people would buy it. All you need is a few raised hands among a hundred people in your
market and you’ve got a winning product idea. But you need to find out before you launch
your product whether it will sell well. I can’t stress that enough, but how do you do it?
There are lots of ways, but one of the easiest ways is to test the concept in front of a focus
group.
As a brand manager, I usually use focus groups to test all of my company’s product ideas
and yet I rarely hear anyone in the infoproduct business talk about using them. Now the
focus groups that I set up for my J.O.B. (more like my research person set’s up) are quite
expensive, but you can do it very cheap…as in FREE. You can get a few people from your
subscriber base to act as a proxy for your entire list. You provide them with a first look at
your products and ideas and see what they think. Ask for and demand feedback. Tell them
not to worry about your feelings. What you want is their honest opinion. When they give it
to you, take notes and lots of them. Their feedback will help you refine your product and
make it much better than it currently is.
Don’t think you can do this? Nonsense. One writer who’s sold over a million copies of just
ONE of her books uses this simple technique to find out if an idea will sell. She writes out a
list of potential product ideas and/or titles and she makes 10 copies of the list. She then
orders a few pizzas and invites 10 of her friends over. Then she hands out the list and has
people circle the 3 ideas they are most interested in. The whole process take less than a
minute and then she collects the pages and the rest of the night is for partying. Later on she
tallies all the votes and if one or two ideas get most of the votes, she knows she’s on to
something.
Am I serious? Can you really do market research like this? The answer is yes. As a brand
manager, I’ve sat in on dozens of focus groups where we pitch product concepts to
consumers. Based on their feedback, we either further develop an idea or we kill it.
But only 10 people? Yes, she uses 10 but they’re from a wide background of people. She’s
got authors, attorneys, and housewives to name a few of the backgrounds. The key is to
have a cross-section of people from your target market to survey. As I mentioned, I used a
larger sampling to come up with the top 3 product ideas that I would focus in on for my
subscribers.
By the way, the above example is a very simple one of passing around ten titles of potential
products. You really should develop a separate page per concept, complete with a
positioning statement, the target market, the price of the product and what sets it apart
from the competition. Creating separate concept statements for each product idea will help
to bring your ideas to life for focus group members and help them better understand what
the product would look like and do.
Just hand out the product concepts, have them review it and over a slice of pizza or a cup of
coffee, discuss with them what they liked and disliked about each of the concepts. Then ask
them to rank their top three favorite concepts. If enough people liked a certain concept,
then you’ve got a winner and you’ve got feedback on the concept to make it stronger. By the
way, you also will have feedback on the other concepts and now you can strengthen the
concepts before your next pizza party, I mean focus group.
Simple Concept Statement - Instant Niche Products
Instant Niche Products is a simple to use and easy-to-follow manual that will walk
newbies through the process of idea generation, idea testing, product creation and the
entire selling process. The manual will focus on digital products that will be sold through
the Internet, but the material will be broad enough that any savvy marketer can learn how
to sharpen their marketing and selling skills through learning the simple 21 steps that every
infopreneur must follow. The manual will sell for $47.
Create a Mastermind Group
You can also use a mastermind group. This is a “jury of your peers” who are other
infopreneurs or business people who you trust. They can help you with your strategic
direction, product ideas and creating product titles.
One word of caution: don’t share too much. If you’ve settled on a title you like, you might
want to spend the $7.95 to lock it up. You never know who in your inner circle might like it
too and take your domain name or share the idea with someone else who will snag your
title, domain name and product idea. Hopefully you can choose people who you’re going to
be helping in addition to their helping you so this shouldn’t be an issue, but it pays to be
careful.
Repeating Myself
Now it’s time to quickly repeat myself. Why? Because some of the same methods and
secrets you’ve used to find out what your starving market wants, as well as develop your
ideas will now be used again to test your ideas. Don’t worry, I know you’re smart, so I’ll just
quickly go through what they are and how you use them to test your ideas.
Asking Your Newsletter List – This is perhaps the smartest and most-efficient way of
getting feedback on your product ideas. Don’t complicate the process. Just say something
to the effect that you’re in the process of figuring out what you’re going to write about next
and ask them what topics they’re most interested in. Their responses will help you make
your decision.
I sent out a note with 10 different product ideas to my ezine list and as a result, I know what
the top 5 products they would be willing to buy. I’ve got a hit list that I will attack as soon as
I finish this e-book.
Discussion Forums – Post your product idea and see if anyone is interested. Don’t post
your product’s title just yet (if you have one) because you don’t want someone stealing it.
Or if you don’t want to post your ideas or say that you’re an author, you could always post a
thread that asks:
“Does anyone know of a product that does [insert your product’s main benefit]”
This will serve two purposes: you get to learn about the competition and you’ll get a lot of
people posting saying something to the effect of “I wish there was.” Either response means
you’ve got a great topic/idea on your hands.
If you get a few hits on the topic and people list out 20 different products and so on, either
you have to put a very unique twist on your product ideas or you’ve got to go back to the
drawing board. And if this happens, don’t sweat it. Be thankful you didn’t waste your time
and money creating a product that was destined to be a loser.
All that stuff you learned about surveys is going to come in handy right about now.
Walking in Your Customer’s Shoes
With all this data in hand you will be able to get a better feeling of the needs and an
understanding of the wants of your core market. But make no bones about it; the very best
way to get a feel for what your customers need is to talk to them directly. You need to see
the world from their eyes, not yours. Take off your marketing shoes and put on the shoes of
your customer. See the world through their eyes and not through the eyes of a business
owner.
Ask yourself “What does a customer want from me?” “What information do they
desperately need?” “What format would they want this information in?” “How much would
they be willing to pay?”
Then you ask yourself “What can I do to help them solve their problem or relieve their
pain?”
Your goal is to solve their problems by providing a product or service that quickly and
efficiently helps them. Doing this exercise is absolutely critical when visiting your
competitors’ stores and web-sites. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Before we talk
about your potential customers, we have to talk about how to find your niche and evaluate
it.
Is it BIG Enough?
When we tell you to create or enter a niche, we’re not saying that you should go after over
100-year old, European men, who like to skydive. Your niche needs to be focused, but be
careful about choosing a niche that’s TOO SMALL. You need to find a market that is big
enough to have a decent number of BUYERS in it. You must make sure that you have
a target audience that is willing to pay for the information that you’re going to
be selling them.
Clickbank
If you’re planning on selling e-books, a great way of finding out if people are making any
money from e-books in your niche is to go to Clickbank. This is the largest “retailer” of ebooks online. Some of the biggest names in the game use Clickbank to handle their
affiliate sales and process their payments. In addition to being the best starting point for a
new author to sell their e-books, it’s also the best place to do research on what’s selling and
what’s not.
Once you go to Clickbank click on the “Promote Products” link and you’ll come to a screen
with several different categories. Select the category that makes the most sense for your ebook topic and see how many e-books pop up in the top 100 that deal with a topic that’s
similar to yours. At the time of this publication, Rosalind Gardner’s The Super Affiliate
Handbook: How I Raked In $436,797 Online Last Year Selling Other People’s
Stuff was the top selling e-book in the ‘Business to Business’ category. If you’re thinking of
selling an e-book on affiliate marketing, there’s a chance that you’ve got a pretty good
market for your product.
What I’m getting at with all this talk of Google and Alexa and Clickbank is that you need to
make sure there’s a market for your e-book BEFORE you write it. I’ll show you
how to find out if there’s a market for your e-book in a few minutes. For now, let’s talk a
little more about your target market.
Don’t skip this step. It’s critical to your success. Once you’ve narrowed down your list of
niches that you want to go after, it’s important to learn a thing or two about your target
market before you start trying to market to them. Let’s turn things over to Renee again and
learn about YOUR target market.
(Your) Target Market
By Renee Kennedy
http://www.thewritemarket.com
If you've developed a survey, you may have a very good idea who your target market is.
Here is another strategy to determine who your target market is:
Sit down with a piece of paper, think about who your target market might be and write down
the answers to the following questions:
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How old are these people?
Are they male or female?
How much money do they make?
What are their occupations?
What is their level of education?
What are their hobbies?
Are they married, single, divorced?
Do they have kids, grandkids?
Are they students?
If you're selling your products with a website, also answer these questions:
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What is their level of experience on the net?
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Have they purchased on the net before?
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Are they using a Mac or a PC?
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Which browser are they using?
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Are they accessing the net through home or work?
You're asking yourself these questions because you want to get a feel for the people you
are trying to sell your product to. You want to know these people as well as you know
yourself.
In the process of selling your products or services, you are going to talk to your customers,
you are going to respond to them, more importantly, you are going to have to find a way to
SELL them on your products. In order to sell, you need to know who they are.
When you have thought about your Target Market, write down a profile of them in your
marketing plan. Write down as many details about these people as you can. You will use
this information to choose your marketing strategies; this information will affect how you
choose to market your products.
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Thanks for the assist Renee. I hope you have gotten a feeling for the types of questions you
should be asking and answering about your target. Let’s move on…
Shut Up and Listen
The best way to find out the concerns and problems of others is to listen more than you talk
during a conversation, online chat, or when you’re in a discussion forum.
It’s really that simple. Ask questions and listen to the responses. TAKE NOTES! Always
take notes on key phrases (keywords) that people use to describe their issues, concerns, and
problems. These keywords will then be used to write your sales copy, back cover of your
book, your table of contents, and even help became the outline for your speeches.
So where do you find your hungry market so you can interview them? You have to do a little
legwork which shouldn’t take more than one or two days.
Yes, that’s all that’s required thanks to the power of the Internet. You can find web-sites
with forums dedicated to the most arcane and highly-specialized topics these days.
Create Your Master List of Problems and Questions
The key is to not only identify your target market, but to immerse yourself into their lives.
You need to know their fears, their dreams, and most importantly their problems. You need
to know what their major concerns are and what their desires are. Then you take all this
information and create a list of questions they want answered, problems they want solved,
or things they want more of or less of in life. Then you take this list and systematically
“build” your products to solve their problems and meet their needs.
When you start with your target market’s needs and desires, the creation of information
products is a very simple process. Whether you’re looking to write a book or an ebook or
create a seminar, you can speed up the process just by finding your market first, asking
them what they want, then giving it to them.
Never forget this simple three-step process (unless you want to waste your time and create
products that don’t sell and nobody wants).
Remember that creating products is very simple. Finding the people who are going to pay
you is the hard part. Isn’t it pretty stupid to create a bunch of information products and
then try to find someone who’s going to buy them? Why not start with the “end” in mind
first and get yourself a starving crowd to satisfy?
So now you know your niche, you know a little about the target market, but can you make
any money creating products for them?
Is the Market Undeserved?
It’s one thing to have a big market and narrowly defined niche, but you have to determine if
your future customers are already satisfied and happy with the products that currently exist
in the marketplace. Chances are that 99 percent of the niches you’ll come across won’t be
overcrowded and satisfied. Which means that you can still make money in them. If you feel
that the niche is satisfied or overcrowded, you can always slice the pie a different way and
go after a different subset of your original niche. Bu be careful. You want to make sure that
there’s still money to be made in that niche.
In short, find out if there are any unmet needs in the niche.
Is There Money to Be Made?
How do you determine if there are enough current paying customers in the niche? You can
do this in a number of ways. The easiest way is to take a look at the best-selling ebooks that
are selling on Clickbank or you can look at the best-seller list on Amazon.com to find
out how well certain products are selling.
You can also look at the data you got by surfing competitive web-sites. Do they have
products and services for sale? What kind of products and how much are they charging?
The Sneaky Way, Which We Don’t Advocate…But….
You can also get information out of your competitors by posing as a potential client. We
don’t advocate doing it this way, but we’ve run into enough budding experts at our seminars
to know that this is one way people are getting competitive information. Request sales
brochures and “welcome” packages that they send out on a regular basis. Ask to speak to
satisfied clients and customers. Then ask them why they’re different than their
competitors. Take particular note and write down their answer. This should be their
“Unique Selling Proposition (or USP)” and it’s important to know what your customers
think theirs is.
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Write down the features and benefits they claim.
Print out pages of their sites, especially the “Home” page because you’ll need them
as reference guides later on for your site.
Sign up for their free newsletters on their sites
Simplify the info because people are on information overload
How? – Find out what the top 2 to 3 problems are and SOLVE THEM, not every
problem ever encountered. Focus, focus, focus.
John Reese, a great infopreneur, likes to say that you should “become a spy.” The fact is
that nobody knows who you are if you’re just starting out. So see what people are doing.
Borrow their ideas and create products that aren’t in direct competition with those you’ve
modeled.
So that’s the sneaky way, but I advocate being direct. Very direct in fact.
Ask Your Competition. Yes, I’m Serious.
It might sound funny, but why not call up the competition and pick their brains. Sounds
crazy right? I mean who in their right mind would give away their secrets to someone who
they’re going to be competing with in a few years.
Many more than you would think.
The key is to position yourself not as a direct competitor, but as someone who is interested
in a similar, but different niche. So how do you make the call?
You simply call them up and tell them that you’re very interested in the category and would
like to start your own business one day. Maybe you ask them if they have an affiliate
program because you would love to sell their products on your site. You tell them that your
subscribers would love to get their hands on the experts products and articles.
If they hesitate, ask them if they wouldn’t mind letting you run some of their articles in your
e-zine or newsletter. Everyone loves free promotion, so they shouldn’t balk at the idea.
You’ll soon find out that you’re going to be networking with your so-called competitors at
trade shows and seminars and they may very well become a joint-venture partner down the
road. More on this later.
Trade Shows
Another great way to find out about the competition is to attend industry trade shows. You
can get a hold of your competitor’s sales brochures, samples of their products and listen to
their sales pitches. In short, you can get an entire preview of how they sell themselves to
potential clients in the manner of a few minutes. Time and money spent attending industry
trade shows is an investment that pays off handsomely.
NETWORK!!!!
You need to get off your butt and press the flesh as the cliché goes. You need to network
with the industry insiders and the movers and shakers within your niche that are making
things happen. Along the way you’re going to find your mentor who’s going to take you
under their wings and mold and shape you, as well as help provide you with a shortcut to
your success in your business.
Of course your mentor isn’t going to just reach out and pick you to be their next pupil. You
have to take the initiative to introduce yourself and show them that you’re someone who is
dedicated to making it in the business and make it clear to them that you’re willing to help
them out with their business as well in exchange for their guidance and coaching.
Internet Forums
Another way is to troll around some internet forums that deal with your niche. Look
through the old posts to get a feel for the forum before posting questions. Perhaps you’ll
find a thread by a subscriber asking whether they should buy a certain product or not.
You’ll instantly find out if a number of people on the site have bought the product or not.
Are There Too Many Players?
So what if you think there are too many players or people competing. Look at the diet
industry. Thousands if not millions of competitors competing for your money. Then along
came Dr. A with his South Beach Diet. It’s simply a twist on the highly successful Atkins
diet. Was that market taken? Sure if you’re looking at the market as “low carb” but Dr. A
put his little twist on the idea (to make it a healthier version) and just like that you have a
very profitable, multi-million dollar business on your hands. And he was a NOBODY a few
years ago.
The rest of this ebook will take you through how you can create your products that will help
establish you as a SOMEBODY in your particular niche. Make that a very rich somebody.
The Importance of Creating a Hook
You must strive to create a unique selling proposition, but more importantly, you need to
create a unique positioning for yourself in your market. There’s a ton of competition on the
Internet and you have to work really, really hard to stand out. The two main ways to do this
is to create a unique product or to create a unique hook or selling proposition that sets you
apart from the competition. I personally think it’s a lot harder to create truly unique
products that people will pay a premium for, so I tell my coaching clients to first focus on
creating a hook for yourself and your products.
Why is this critical? To keep this short, the main reason is that your competitors are
probably creating very similar products to yours and they’re using the same promotional
strategies (e-zine marketing, discussion forums, free e-books, joint ventures, etc.) that
you’re using to promote your business. You have to create a hook or a compelling reason
for a visitor to your web-site to become one of your customers.
How To Come Up with Your Hook
Now focus on your topic and start envisioning what process, step-by-step formula you’re
going to create and everything else you’re going to right about. Think about the success
you’ve had in this area and how quickly you can teach someone how to do what you do.
What’s your angle, how are you different from all the other books in your niche? You need a
way to differentiate yourself from the pack. Your book is a selling tool, never forget that.
So what’s your hook?
What do you help people do faster, easier, more-efficiently? How does it save them more
money? What extraordinary results have you seen with your system?
Why is Your e-Book or Product Better than the Competition?
Along the same lines of creating a hook for yourself, what’s your point of difference versus
the competition?
•
•
Is your program simple to implement?
Do you get results in half the time?
Think hard and write out the list of benefits of not only your e-book, but of your services.
These “one-liners” will be useful when it comes time to write sales copy and handle
interviews from the press.
Okay, now for one of the most critical parts of this whole Niche It step: picking your title.
I’m going to jump around a bit between the tasks you have to take because they’re all interrelated and you’re going to find yourself going back again and again to do the tasks until you
find the perfect killer title. More on that in just a few seconds. For now, think hard and
write out that list of benefits and why your product is better than the competition:
The benefits of my product:
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
Why my product is better than the competition:
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
Keep this piece of paper in a secure place because you’re going to need it later on in the
process of trying to sell your product.
One last important piece of advice. You must strive to “Chicken Soup” or “Hypnotic-ize”
your products.
“Chicken Soup” and “Hypnotic-ize” Your Products
What the heck does that heading mean? Well, unless you’ve been living under a rock for the
past decade, then you already are aware of the Chicken Soup for the Soul phenomenon.
What the series creators Mark Victor Hansen and Jack Canfield did was create a series of
books all under the one name: Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Infopreneur Joe Vitale has done the same with his Hypnotic copywriting series. I’ve seen
a number of people do it, but not to the level of Joe, Jack and Mark.
The same can be said of the “For Dummies,” “Idiot’s Guide,” “Harry Potter,” and dozens of
other series.
The reason I bring this up is that if you should strive to create products under a
series name if possible. This way when someone reads book #2 in the series, they’re
compelled to read book #1, then they find out that book #3 is coming out and they rush to
go get it.
Harry Potter aside, my favorite example that I share with my clients is Sue Grafton. She’s a
murder mystery writer who’s created what I call her “Alphabet Series.” Her first book was
“A is for Alibi,” then she writes “B is for Burglar” and so on. She’s up to “R is for Ricochet” I
believe and when all is said and done, she’ll have 26 books in the series. Make that 26 bestsellers because everyone who reads “C is for Corpse” they go out and get all the rest in the
series.
I made the mistake of not coming up with a series name for my products, so there’s no
unifying name that once spoken would instantly identify the product with me.
And we’ll talk about creating a “funnel” full of products later on, but realize that regardless
of your niche, you can create dozens of products using different formats for your series.
SUPER TIP: If you were planning your back-end while creating your first product and
planning to do a series, but the first book/e-book/product didn’t pan out, you have two
choices: create the second in the series and see how it does or move on and create another
series. If the first book takes off, you can always go back and create the rest of the series.
S
tep ##3
3 –– G
ive IItt TTo
o TThem
hem
Step
Give
Now that we have two of the key steps in the process done (Find a Starving Crowd and
Asking Them What they Want), it’s on to steps #3: Giving Them What They Want! This
step is the most involving and will require most of your time and effort. While the first two
steps can take a day or two, it usually takes 7 to 14 days for experienced infopreneurs to put
together a product and web-site. Some have shown that they can do it in less than 24 hours
and that’s why the subtitle of this product is: How to Turn Your Idea into a Profitable
Product in as little as 24 hrs!
So doing it in anywhere from 24 hours to 7 days is the gold standard, but if you have limited
experience with creating information products, expect to spend anywhere from 30 to 60
days creating your product, bonuses, sales letter, web-site and promotional materials. With
that having been said, let’s get into the various steps you’re going to have to take in order to
give your starving crowd a product they’re desperate for!
S
tep ##3a
3a –– C
reate aa S
exy TTitle
itle ffor
or Y
our P
roduct
Step
Create
Sexy
Your
Product
The title of your product is absolutely critical to your success. If your product title sucks,
your sales will suck.
Get it? Again, YOU MUST HAVE A KILLER TITLE THAT SELLS YOUR PRODUCT FOR
YOU!!!!!!
“Yeah, yeah, yeah. I hear what you’re saying fabman.”
Do you? Do you really understand how critical it is to your product’s success? Ultimately
you want your title to do two things very, very well: Get the attention of your target market
and Communicate your products benefits.
Let’s talk a little about the first one: attention. In marketing we talk about the A.I.D.A.
principle. You know:
Attention: You’re trying to get the attention of the audience
Interest: You’re trying to get them to be interested in what you’re saying
Desire: You want to tug at their emotional strings and get them involved
Action: You want them to take further action (and hopefully buy your products at some
point)
Once you get their attention, it’s going to be up to your sales letter to gain their interest and
tug at their emotions to get them to buy, but I’m getting ahead of myself. First things first
and that’s about capturing the attention of your target market.
Getting the Attention You Deserve
Your killer title, one that’s sexy and benefit-laden (more on this in a second) serves to help
capture the attention of your potential buyer. You want a sexy title that they read and
instantly say “Hmm. I wonder if it’s any good” or “I want to know more about that
product.”
Okay, so they don’t exactly say the above using the exact phrases, but you get the point. You
want your title to have STOPPING POWER!!!
Communicating Your Product Benefits
The next thing you want your title to do is quickly communicate the ultimate benefit of your
product to your target audience. Your product must be full of benefits and/or solutions.
This way when a prospective customer reads it, they immediately know that your product
will help them solve their problems. I think my e-book Write It Fast! does a great job of
telling my target consumer that this e-book will help them quickly write their first book.
Instant Sales Letters definitely does this. You have a problem, you want to write a sales
letter, but don’t know how. You read the word “Instant” and you’re immediately interested.
The title has captured your attention and it speaks to the products ultimate benefit: namely
helping you create a sales letter practically overnight.
Does that make sense? Good, let’s move on.
Choose a Title that’s Full of Benefits and Solutions
It takes the average buyer at a bookstore only 8 seconds to decide whether they want a book
or not. You probably have less time than that to hook someone online. In short, you must
have a killer title to sell your e-book online.
Good Keywords
One of the easiest ways to create an e-book or product name that has stopping power is to
find good keywords for your niche/target market and use it in your title. Or you can find a
catch phrase that’s widely used in your niche and use it as your product’s title. Just hop on
over to www.GoodKeywords.com and find out what people are searching for within your
topic or category. You can also do a search on www.Google.com and see what terms are
used most often, etc. A little more advanced tool can be found at www.WordTracker.com.
They compile a database of terms that people search for. You enter some keywords, and we
tell you how often people search for them, and also tell you how many competing
sites use those keywords. This information can be helpful to see just how much
competition you have out there.
Then you need to see if the domain name for your title or keywords is available using
www.Register.com or www.GoDaddy.com. I’ll talk more about these resources in the next
step.
"Target the wrong keywords and all your efforts will be in vain."
Brent Winters, President, FirstPlace Software, Inc
Remember, people want a title that’s easy to remember and instantly relays the benefits
they will get from buying your eBook. You MUST have bold colors and simple graphics.
Remember, short, sexy titles are better than long drawn out titles. You want to be able to
display your title (or your benefits) on your cover in big bold letters.
Remember, keep it simple…but sexy.
So…what’s your sexy title? Think The South Beach Diet, not Bob’s Low Carb Solution
Manual.
Think The Automatic Millionaire, not Money Budgeting Advice You Should Follow.
What’s My Sexy Title?
___________________________________________
Possible Other Titles
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
___________________________________________
Why list out other titles? Because yours might not be available.
What do you mean?
Is Your Title Available?
Your stroke of genius might have been someone else’s brilliant idea years before or even
days before you came up with the idea for your e-book. You need to make sure your title
and more importantly, the domain name, is still available. More on domain names in a
second, but let’s see what the competition is up to first.
Then hop on over to www.Amazon.com to see if anyone has used the title previously. You
can do a more thorough and extensive search using the Books in Print database, but
Amazon.com has most of the books ever printed listed in its database, so you should be
good to go after a quick search on Amazon.com.
Amazon Rank of Books on My eBook Subject
Book Title
_______________________
Sales Rank
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
And let’s face it. The titles that sell in the offline world might not be the best-sellers in the
online world. If you’re having trouble coming up with title names, then you probably need
some inspiration. Where do you go to find out what’s selling and what sexy titles there are
out there in the marketplace? There’s only one place you need to look: Clickbank
Clickbank is the largest seller of e-books online. If you’re not familiar with the site, visit it,
bookmark it and research what’s selling and what’s not on a weekly basis. It’s part of your
job as an e-author now.
Clickbank Sales
Product Title
_______________________
Sales Rank
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
Clickbank New Products List
Product Title
Sales Rank (among new products)
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
After you do this little exercise, you’re going to be better versed in what makes up a
killer/sexy title.
YOUR NEXT STEPS
Now that you know about the importance of picking a killer title and how important
keywords are, you’re going to want to hop on the Internet and start finding out what titles
are taken and what will be the title of your best-selling e-book.
But step back for a moment. Even though I talked about picking a title first, then going to
Amazon.com, then Clickbank and finally to GoDaddy.com, you can do any of the tasks in
any order you want. I find it easy to do things in this order:
1. Do a search on Clickbank to see what’s selling.
2. Do a keyword search on www.Goodkeywords.com to see what keywords in my topic
are being searched frequently.
3. Brainstorm some killer sexy titles.
4. See if the domain name is available at www.GoDaddy.com and if it is, buy it.
I don’t generally bother with Amazon.com because it’s not relevant to selling e-books, but it
is an extra step that some of my coaching clients like to take.
So what I’m telling you is that the order of the next steps is up to you, but you MUST do all
4 steps listed above. Skip one of them and you might choose a marginal title.
Marginal Titles = Marginal Sales
Scan the bestseller list and you’ll see that the above equation holds true. Just head on over
to Clickbank and you’ll see that 7 to 8 of the top 10 bestselling e-books have great titles.
S
tep ##3b
3b –– G
et Y
our D
omain N
am e &
osting
Step
Get
Your
Domain
Name
&H
Hosting
The next step that you need to take is to get your domain name and sign up for a web
hosting account. You MUST have a separate domain name for each product you sell.
Selling multiple products on the same domain name is less than optimal. Actually it will set
you up for failure because you don’t want your potential customer to have too many
decisions to make. You want them to go to your site, read your sales letter and then buy
your product.
You don’t want them to come to your site, browse through the dozens of products listed,
sign up for a newsletter, read articles and then maybe click on one of your sales letters.
Keep it simple: one killer domain name/title per product. Let’s tackle getting a killer
domain name first.
You Must Get a Killer Domain Name
Your domain name is such a critical factor to your success these days. Since you’re going to
be competing with thousands upon thousands of other sites for people’s attention, you’ve
got to cut through the clutter. You want your domain name to be easy to remember and
describe your product to your consumer if you’re going to get your target market to notice
you. Let’s cover these two points more in-depth.
Shorter Names are Better
It’s always best to use a shorter domain name versus a long name. Short names are easier
to remember and easier to type into a browser without making a mistake. One word
domain names are better than multiple-word domain names. And you can forget about
using domain names with cute alliterations or using the number “4” instead of “four.”
People tend to spell out names. You should also avoid hyphens in your domain name,
regardless of how your search engine’s algorithms search for sites.
Note: Domain names with hyphens serve an alternative purpose of increasing your search
engine ranking because search engines are better able to read your domain name, pages and
site content. However, I still recommend that you park your sales letter on a domain name
without hyphens. I can’t explain it all, but my friend Marc Harty does a great job in his
ebook entitled: Strategic Traffic. It shows you how to send targeted traffic to your site on
a ZERO ad budget. In the e-book he shares his 21 secrets to getting zero cost, highly
targeted traffic. It’s one of those “Must Read” resources.
Get a Domain Name that Describes What You Do or Sell
It’s also a critical factor to see if you can find a domain name that uses one of the key
keywords that people use to find your product or service. A domain name like
www.InstantSalesLetters.com is a good one for what else; people looking for help with
writing sites that will help them write sales letters.
My main web-site is www.FabmanSecrets.com. Obviously it doesn’t really tell you what I
do or what niche I play in (it’s mainly a site for people looking to improve their finances,
learn how to invest and get out of the Rat Race). I chose the domain name at the last
minute after finding out that my #1 choice was taken. The name I wanted was in my head
for three years…and I never bothered to buy it.
Now I have thousands of subscribers that are used to going to www.FabmanSecrets.com, so
how do you start getting them to another site? I could do this rather easily from a technical
standpoint. All I have to really do is have the domain name “forwarded” to another domain
name, but what a headache. Had I gone online to www.GoDaddy.com and done a search for
it when I first came up with the idea, I could have locked it up for the low price of $8.95 (or
less) a year. They’ve been running promotions for $7.45 a year if you sign up for 2 years at a
time. Don’t make the mistake of not locking up your domain name.
Finding Your Perfect Domain Name
So I goofed, but how do you avoid the same problem? You need to brainstorm some
keywords that your target customers search for when looking for information on your topic.
There are plenty of free tools on the internet that do searches of the most popular words
that are searched on the Internet, but www.GoodKeyWords.com offers one of the best
tools around.
You simply type in the name of the product category you’re playing in or the name of the
service you provide. Then one you run the query you’ll see how many times that keyword
was searched in the past month.
Plus you’ll get a list of similar search words and how often they were searched.
Good Keywords for My eBook Subject
Keyword
_______________________
# Searches
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
_______________________
_________
Note: Save this information to refer back to when you’re writing your sales letter
Now you know what search terms are popular and using these keywords you need to come
up with a short, memorable name for your web-site. Then you head on over to
www.register.com to find out if someone has stolen (I mean already taken) the perfect name
for your business. Don’t delay locking up your domain name. Both of us have missed out
on domain names we’ve wanted by a matter of weeks.
So while you’re at www.register.com you enter in the domain name you want to see if it’s
available. If someone already has it, you can do a “whois” search on the registrant to find
out who owns it, how long they’ve owned it, and if it’s set to expire. We will often open up
another browser on our computer to see if the site is live or whether the individual is just
“parking” the name for later use. If the latter is the case, you can decide whether to make
them an offer to buy the domain name. Expect to pay a couple hundred bucks. If it’s a good
name, you can expect some owners to demand higher prices. Fabio had one overzealous
owner ask for a “minimum of $6,000” for the domain name. He promptly said “no thank
you” and found a better domain name the next day. But….
If the name is available, run over to www.GoDaddy.com, create an account, and purchase
the domain name…TODAY!
Dot Com or Nothing
And you better run to the Internet and claim your domain name fast because they’re
running out..FAST!!! As the Internet explodes with popularity and more would-be
entrepreneurs jump on the web in search of riches, they’re scooping up all the best domain
names. More often than not, they’re taking domain names that end with the suffix: .com.
And this is a problem because you want to have a domain that ends with “.com” and not one
that ends with .org, .net, .edu, or .anything else besides .com. Simply put, dot com domain
names are the industry standard and they instantly convey to your target customers a sense
of permanency and stability.
Web Hosting
Dozens upon dozens of options await you. The “best” hosting companies change year to
year and it’s not likely that you’re going to need all the bells and whistles when starting out,
so start out with a cheap plan that gives you enough bandwidth and tools. At most, your
monthly hosting should run you around $25. That’s at the high end. That’s at the high end
and if you’re looking to spend in that range and get all the bells and whistles you’ll ever
need; your best option is Third Sphere. Both of us use Third Sphere and we’re
extremely happy with our support, the features and benefits the company offers.
Some hosting companies will offer you a generic autoresponder as part of the package. This
is a good place to start if you want to save money and test the waters for your site to see if
you can make money at it, but we HIGHLY RECOMMEND that you sign up for a
separate autoresponder service. You don’t want to be stuck with the situation where
you’ve built your list on a hosting company’s server and you get accused of spam and they
shut down your account and you lose your list (if you didn’t download it/export it
frequently). Or you don’t want to have to go through the hassle of importing your ezine list
into a new autoresponder system and have to send a note to your subscribers asking them
to “double-opt-in” to satisfy your new autoresponders’ requirements.
That was a bunch of words, wasn’t it? The long and short of it is that we suggest you bite
the bullet and either buy a fully contained system like AutoresponsePlus or your go to
www.1automationwiz.com and sign up for their basic/intro package. It’s only $19 a
month which will get you either unlimited autoresponders or their starter shopping cart
package. Their basic ecommerce package will run you $39 a month.
Accepting Payment
You can pay a minimal fee to get a Clickbank account. Both systems will allow you to
accept credit cards, but Clickbank will not allow you to sell physical products. Another
option that you should seriously look into is PayPal, which is very easy to use and
according to one expert I interviewed for this manual, having a PayPal button on his sites
increased sales by 15%. Why the increase when you already have Clickbank which
accepts practically every type of credit card? Because with PayPal, it’s cold hard cash that
people have in their account. The money is sitting there and chances are they’re never
going to transfer it out. Their PayPal money is their play money and they will spend it
more freely versus having the money hit a credit card. Weird, but I happen to fall into this
camp of treating my PayPal money as money I get to spend freely on information products.
Bottom Line: Put a PayPal button on your site and increase your sales dramatically!
Another reason to go with someone like www.1automationwiz.com is that they allow
you to accept credit cards, bill your customers monthly, and you get to create an affiliate
program if you sign up for their pro package. They’ll even provide you with the merchant
account.
MakeBuyingEasy Complete Automation System
Internet Marketer extraordinaire Terry Dean has a system that’s reasonably priced versus
other “one-stop-shop” type of programs. He bills it as the “Complete eBusiness Automation
System that Can Turn Any "Normal" Web Site Into a Supercharged Order Pulling
Machine with Dozens of Cutting Edge Secret Weapons”
That was a mouthful, but the system features really do offer you everything you need to sell
stuff on the net, including:
Plug-In Affiliate Software, Easy to Use Ordering Systems, Unlimited Sequential
Autoresponders, Digital Product Delivery, Back-up Ordering Methods, A Copyrighted
Tracking System, and too many other features for me to list. If you’d like to kick the tires
and check it out for yourself, just head on over to ww.makebuyingeasy.com and find out
why this package is so amazing!
S
tep ##3c
3c –– C
r e a te Y
our S
ystem or
olutio
n
or S
io
Step
Create
Your
System
Soluti
on
Before You Get Ahead of Yourself, Define Your Solution…
Too many newbies jump into the product creation stage without taking the time to really
think through the solution for their customer’s problems or needs. They just say “I’m going
to write about this subject, so let me do some research and start creating the product.”
WRONG. That’s a ticket to a dead end street with no hopes of every getting back on the
information superhighway! To put it very simply, before you can start creating your
product, you have to define your solution and then create an outline for your product. Do
NOT pass GO! without doing this first!
“Defining Your Solution – Very simply what you need to do, step-by-step, how to solve
[your customer’s problem]. Take a piece of paper, and once you’ve identified your problem
that you’re going to solve, write some simple steps on how to solve it. That’s it, just a basic
outline of how you envision what your application or information product should be, and
how you’re going to go about solving that particular problem.”
- Armand Morin, Creator of Audio Generator and
too many other products to mention
Create a System
A moment ago I talked about how much I loved to create a system for people to follow and
there’s a good reason. You become known for and your name gets attached to the system.
Whenever someone talks about the method, your name gets mentioned.
Any time someone talks about NLP, they bring up Anthony Robbins. Anytime someone
talks about guerilla marketing, they mention Jay Conrad Levinson. The same holds true for
Neil Rackham and his SPIN selling technique.
So what system can you come up with?
Not really the type to come up with new systems? How about taking an existing system or
method and putting a twist on it and presto…you’ve got a killer product proposition. Read
on…
Same Information, Better Package?
Chances are that whatever you’re going to write about has been written about by many,
many other writers. Chances are your software product is not going to be unique, nor is
your diet program. So the best thing you can do is learn how to create a compelling
message for why consumers need to buy your product absolutely, positively RIGHT NOW.
You do this through a process of looking at the major problems of your target market and
looking at your product. Then you come up with a unique twist/hook that you use to sell
your system to your starving crowd.
Now the above might sound difficult and time consuming, but the reality is that it’s not.
Tony Robbins = NLP
South Beach Diet = A Healthier Atkins Diet
Jay Conrad Levinson = Guerrilla Marketing
Robert Kiyosaki = Rich Dad Poor Dad
The above writers took some existing technology or material, put a unique spin on it and
made millions. Make that hundreds of millions of dollars from creating unique and
powerful twists on information that already existed. That’s the power of creating your own
system for people to use.
If you’re writing a non-fiction book that’s geared toward the self-help market or is intended
to help someone do something or achieve something, then it’s absolutely critical that you
develop a unique selling proposition or a hook as to why your book and system is better
than what’s out there.
Think hard and find out a way that your system will save people more time, money, effort
and so on and you’ll be rich beyond your wildest dreams. Tim is our most valuable asset
and in this new century we have less of it than ever before. We’re overloaded with
information and we just need to find that simple magic pill that’s going to work for
us…effortlessly. If you can find a way to solve a major problem that people have and do it in
a way that’s faster, simpler and gets results faster, you’ll be a millionaire before you know it.
Systemize to Profit
I’m not going to go into too much detail on this step because I don’t want you to overthink
things. Just brainstorm and think up a way to create a simple system that’s different than
your competitors. For inspiration, just look what Stephen Covey did with The Seven
Habits of Highly Effective People. By coming up with new language and creating a
simple seven step process or characteristics people had, he made it easier for people to
remember some of the characteristics. Then whenever someone said “we’ve got to think
win/win,” they instantly thought of Covey’s book.
The absolute master at doing this is Robert Kiyosaki. Take a look at any new book he
creates and there’s usually one or two diagrams, seventeen catch phrases and a host of new
words that he’s created or pushed together so that they’re unique to him and his Rich DadTM
books, tapes, CDs, forums, software, and coaching products.
Use Acronyms or Memorable Characters if Possible
One way to get your product to stand out is to try and make the steps in your system spell
something with the first letter or letters in each of the steps. This makes it easy for readers
to remember the steps in the process and be able to tell others about the steps in your
program. If your system lends itself to an acronym, then go for it. Don’t try to force feed it
if you’ve got nothing to work with. Just stick with it long enough and even if you come up
with all “S’s” you might create the next “7-S Model” which business schools love to talk
about (but I still never remember all 7).
Another way of doing it is to create memorable characters in your book. This is what Robert
Kiyosaki did when he created his “Rich Dad” character in his books. Mark Victor Hansen
and Robert Allen created a memorable character in their book The One Minute Millionaire
and the more they wrote about her, the more people could identify with her and her dire
situation.
Sometimes the characters don’t have to be made up, but can be very outlandish or
memorable real life people. And often you’ll come across best-sellers that have ordinary
people doing extraordinary things. This worked well for Spencer Johnson, author of Who
Moved My Cheese. What memorable or outlandish characters can you use in your
information products? Think hard and remember the people and situations that you’ve
encountered in your life. Remember, people love a great story and they love a story even
more if there are some memorable characters that they can identify with.
Just to clarify, I’m not telling you to create a work of fiction. What I am saying is that you
should strive to use colorful stories and lessons in your products so that it’s easier to get
your message and system across to your readers. In fact, it can be said that two of the most
important components of a successful information product is the core content and the
personal experiences you include in the product. People want to know that you’ve “been
there, done that” when it comes to presenting them with information and new systems.
Make sure you show them and tell them about your personal experiences by using personal
examples throughout your product to clarify the main points of your system, as well as
communicate how easy something is to implement.
The Easy Way to Create a System
Probably one of the easiest ways to create a system within your niche is to look outside your
niche or field of interest and see what others are doing. You can analyze products and
approaches in order to see what might be best used for your products and services. This is a
quick and easy way to create a “new” system that no one in your niche has seen. It might be
a new training method that someone in the insurance field is using and you can bring over,
modify and use for your HR training system. The possibilities are endless and best of all,
most of the hard work is already done for you.
Just be careful not to copy or use proprietary materials or terminology from the other field.
Doing that will land you in some hot water (i.e., legal trouble).
S
tep ##3d
3d –– C
r e a te Y
our P
roduct
Step
Create
Your
Product
What Will Your Product Look Like?
Even before you start working on your product, you have to envision what it will look like.
You should have done this earlier during the QuickStormingTM process, so it should be easy
to turn to the page in your idea journal that talked about all the things you want your
product to do for people.
Formats for Your Products
The format of your product operates on two levels: the type of content that you will use to
create your product and the actual physical format of the product. We’ll cover the physical
format of your product a lot later, but you should begin to think about how you want to
format the content of your product.
Product Content Formats
!
!
!
!
Step-by-Step System to Follow
Q&A or Expert Interviews
How I did it and you can too
Hybrid of any of the above
Step-by-Step System Format
This is one of my favorite formats to use. I think it’s critical that if you’re going to play in
some arena and have plans to be viewed as an expert in your niche, you’re going to have to
develop your own lingo and processes that people can use to achieve the results they want to
achieve. Again, just create a step-by-step process to SOLVE A BIG PROBLEM that your
market has and you’re golden. Later on I’ll talk more about how to create your own system.
Q&A or Expert Interviews
When we spoke about someone not being an expert in a niche, we said that it would be easy
for them to reach out and ask an expert for help. Whether through a collaboration or coauthoring an e-book or perhaps interviewing the expert, the newbie could instantly create a
product to sell based on the knowledge of the expert. Again, this is what Shawn Casey
and Joe Kumar did and they’ve made millions of dollars thanks to this powerful format.
Not sure what to ask? Just poll your subscriber list, hold a teleseminar and open up the
lines for questions to be asked and so on. It’s really not that difficult to go out and find a
questionnaire that someone else developed and create your own list of questions based on
your “model” questionnaire. Keep it simple, remember that.
Conducting interviews with experts in a niche, then transcribing the interviews and
packaging them into an e-book is one of the easiest ways to create a product.
Unfortunately, when something is easy to do and easy to profit from, everyone and their
mother tends to jump on the bandwagon. That’s exactly what’s happening right now on the
Internet. There are dozens of “compilation” and interview-type e-books on the market. The
really bad news is that some of them are poorly put together and don’t offer anything new to
the customer who is shelling out their money.
So beware of this “easy” way to create products. If you’re going to go this route, I suggest
you take a look at what John Evans did. He took a common format and idea (interviewing
experts who are making millions online) and added a new spin to it: interviewing ordinary
people who aren’t big names that are quietly making a lot of money online. It’s no wonder
that experts like Rosalind Gardner and Joe Vitale saw the uniqueness in the product
and quickly promoted it to their lists.
Another example of taking the interview concept to the next level is Corey Rudl. He created
a membership site where you could go and there’s a ton of resources on their to teach you
how to create information products, but what made it unique is that every month he
profiles/interviews two ordinary people who are making boatloads of money online. The
site, Secrets to Their Success is an overnight best-selling service/product.
How I Did It Format
The “How I did it (and you can too)” format is not as popular right now, but they’re pretty
powerful nonetheless. Essentially what you do is tell your story of where you were starting,
what you did and how easy it is for someone else to do what you did.
Hybrid Format
This is what the name implies: taking various pieces of the other formats and slapping them
together. For instance, with my e-book on writing e-books The One Minute eBook, I
created a step-by-step system for people to use. This covered the first ¾ of the e-book and
then I interviewed some successful e-book authors and put the interviews in the back of the
e-book for reference purposes. This hybrid format is very successful and it helped to
reiterate and reinforce my step-by-step system because many of the authors touched upon
several or all of the steps I discussed.
Let’s get right into it here. Enough of talking about why you should have your own product
and how you get your domain name and….
Now that you’ve got your product has a starving crowd that’s willing to pay for your product
and you’ve developed your system or solution, it’s time to talk about actually creating your
infoproduct. There are 7 main ways that you can get your name on a product or at
minimum begin selling a product where you get a large share of the profits:
1. Create your own product
2. Create a product with another writer or partner
3. Have someone create the product for you
4. Buy the rights to a product and market/sell it
5. Find information and products to market that are in the Public Domain
6. Chicken Soup It! - Get others to contribute to your project
7. Just Added! – Transforming a raw product or data you bought
I’m not going to go into too much detail on the 5 different ways that you can create products
without having to write a word of the e-book or write the code for them. Why not? Because
this e-book is about YOU creating products quickly by writing and creating them yourself,
not getting someone else to do it. But, I know the power of using the 5 techniques listed
above, so let’s go over them briefly.
Option #1. Create Your Own Product
The focus of this manual is to help you create “Instant Niche Products” and my hope is that
you learn how to do it on your own so you can keep 100% of the profits. Now you can keep
100% of the profits by investing very little money up-front through ways #3 & #4 above and
you definitely can invest practically NOTHING and do it via method #5, but I still feel that if
you’re going to become an expert in your niche, it’s worth the investment in terms of time,
money and energy to research your niche and create your own products…so you can become
an expert in the process.
And if you’re scared at the prospects of writing an e-book that’s 150 to 250 pages, relax. It’s
not as difficult as it seems. First off the type of writing that you’re going to be doing is
much, much different than the kind you used to do in high school or college. Nobody’s
going to come after you with a red pen and circle your grammatical and spelling errors
(your editor will help you with those).
Secondly, you’re going to be writing about something you love in a conversational manner
and to create 150 pages of text, you only need 50 to 80 pages of solid content. Really, that’s
all you need.
Thirdly, you’re not going to be judged on how well-written the product is, just how well it
solves your customer’s problem or need. You won’t be graded, I promise. Actually, I take
that back. You will be graded. The better your product is and the better it’s marketed, the
more money you’re going to make. That’s Donald Trump’s favorite scorecard and it should
be yours as well.
“Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score.
The real excitement is playing the game.”
– Donald Trump
Still not convinced it’s that easy? For more help on writing e-books in particular, check out:
If you’re planning on writing a book and want the inside scoop on my formula for writing
books FAST, check out my e-book on the subject: Write it FAST! How to Write a Book
in 30 Days…or less!
Okay, want one of the biggest secrets from both e-books? You need a detailed outline to
write from.
A Detailed Outline
You absolutely positively MUST have a detailed outline of your e-book, book, CD or any
other infoproduct BEFORE you write a word. A detailed outline will give you the skeleton
of what you need to create, and then once it’s done, you go about putting the “meat” on the
skeleton. It’s that simple. Just create a very detailed outline and then begin attacking each
heading and subheading by writing a few sentences/paragraphs under each.
Once you have the outline with subpoints to cover, you’re going to find that creating your
information product isn’t that difficult at all. Just don’t fall into the “But I’m not an Expert”
trap.
Become an Expert
“But I’m Not an Expert. How can I write an e-book or create a product on a subject?”
Who cares what you know and don’t know right now. It doesn’t matter that you’re a
virtually nobody in your chosen niche. You’ll learn soon enough that you can become one
virtually overnight if you know how to do it right.
Yes, I’m serious. Just decide that you’re going to become an expert and then become one.
It’s that simple. Everyday people have done it, why not you?
This is the whole premise behind my e-book that I wrote with Matt Bacak. The e-book,
How to Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less! will show you the 10 critical steps you
need to take in order to become a master expert in your niche. Only want a little celebrity
status, just complete the first 4 or 5 steps and you’ll be well on your way.
Here’s a quick excerpt from How to Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less! that talks
about how you can quickly become an expert in your chosen field. Enjoy!
Do You Need to Know Everything About Everything?
While the public at large might perceive a guru like Anthony Robbins to know everything
about personal development and think a superstar sales trainer like Brian Tracy would
know everything there is to know about selling and developing rainmakers. And you don’t
need to know everything about your particular are or category either, but you should know
95 percent about your niche.
Know Your Niche Inside and Out
This is why we advise people to take a quick inventory of what they already know and the
topics that they’re passionate about. It’s this combination of already acquired knowledge
and something that you feel passionate about that makes for the best niches for would-be
experts.
Why?
Because when you’re passionate about something it’s easy to spend hours and hours
learning more about it and that passion will translate into passionate, powerful, and
profitable speeches, books, seminars, and bootcamps where you get to talk for hours on
end about your favorite passion.
Now that’s what’s meant by DOING WHAT YOU LOVE!
But What if I Don’t Know Enough?
Then learn it. That’s the simple answer and it’s the truth. Do a self-analysis or an inventory
of your skills in your particular area. Determine what areas you’re weak in and then go
about filling in the voids. You’ll probably just need a few days surfing on the Internet or
reading 1 or 2 well-chosen books on the topic.
What’s Your Twist?
With dozens of competitors, web-sites, and products vying for your target customers, how
are you going to stand out? Ask yourself:
“How am I different/better than anyone else in this field?”
“What can I give my customers that my competition can’t?”
“How will I set myself apart from the competition?”
By answering these questions, you will begin to craft your unique niche within the broader
category that you compete in. Then you will begin the process of communicating this
unique point of difference to your potential customers and they will see you as the ONLY
answer to their problems and challenges they are facing.
Again, the key to creating a great niche and establishing yourself as the guru that
transforms lives and businesses is to put yourself in your customer’s shoes. If you were a
customer experiencing your business for the first time, what would you expect? What
would you want to change? What would you want more of? Would you be more concerned
with price or quality?
We thought so. Now let’s talk about how you’re going to become such an expert in the first
place.
How Do You Gain Your Expertise?
But what do you do if you don’t have a lot of knowledge in a particular niche that you want
to carve out for you and your business.
Despair? Break out in hives? Give up and go back to the 9-to-5 drudgery?
No, you just have to commit yourself to a power-packed learning program. Over the course
of the next couple of weeks you’re going to inundate yourself with every magazine, article,
and resource out there in your given area.
Books – If there are books written about the niche you’ve chosen for yourself, you MUST
read them…preferably all of them. Why all of them? Because you want to know how
people are currently talking about and dealing with the issues within your industry and you
need to be able to find creative ways to present the information in a new and exciting (read:
engaging) way. Reading the books will also help get you up to speed and fill in the voids in
your current knowledge about the niche you’ve chosen. Visit Amazon.com to find out the
top-selling books in your category/market. Look through what customers are saying about
the books and search through the table of contents and so on. Then buy the books and
skim through/read through them to get your hands on some of the best information around
about your niche. Now you know what other experts are saying and you’ll be better
prepared to help your clients, as well as tell them why your services and products are better
than the competition.
Magazines – There are thousands of magazines out there and they cater to every
conceivable category and specialty. They’re not mainstream magazines, they’re trade
journals. Find out which ones are relevant to your niche and subscribe to them. Reading
your industry’s magazine of choice will help keep you on top of changes within your area of
expertise, as well as provide you with an outlet for your articles down the road. Study the
writing style and subjects that the authors cover in the magazine, because one day soon
you’ll be pitching your articles to the magazine.
Web-Sites - While doing your search online for articles to read and associations to join,
you’re going to come across useful web-sites that have information and data on your area
of expertise. You’ll also come across the web-sites of the competition. Bookmark the best
sites for easy reference.
Newsletters – Most savvy internet marketers have newsletters or ezines as they’re called
online that are free. Join the ones that seem most relevant and make sure you read them
all. You want to note who’s writing articles in the ezines and visit their sites and sign up for
their ezines as well. Ezines will offer you the most current and up-to-date information on
what’s going on in your category. You can also quickly identify the key players and reach
out to them and either partner with them or learn from them.
Attend Seminars – Yes you’ll be giving them soon enough, but you need to get up to
speed very quickly on what others are doing to position themselves as experts in the field.
Take note of the topics they discuss and the solutions they present to the most common
problems.
Associations – Do a search on Google to find out if there are any associations that you
can join. Attend industry gatherings and make sure you talk to people. Hand out your
business card and make some friends/allies/mentors. You need to plug yourself into THE
network of movers and shakers. Speaking of networks…
Network – While you’re at the seminars and conventions you MUST “press the flesh” and
meet the movers and shakers at these events. It also doesn’t hurt to interact with your
future clients and customers and ask them questions about why they attended the seminar
and what they’re trying to get out of it. The more you ask, the more you will learn about the
psyche of and reasons people need help.
Talk to Experts – Along the same lines, try and strike up a conversation with the seminar
leader or other association members. Yes, sounds funny at first, but you really should go
out and talk with your future “competition.” Why? Because you’re probably going to
become friends with the so-called competition. In fact you can’t help it. You’re going to be
giving speeches at the same seminars and bootcamps, meeting at the same association
dinners, and so on. If you read enough books by those on the “speaking circuit” you’ll find
that the same people are giving testimonials in each others books. Why? Because they all
know each other and help each other out.
But back to the point we were trying to make. You need to talk to these experts. You’ll
learn what they think are the main issues and concerns with your potential clients and they
can help point you in the right direction of how to make it in the business. The both of us
have benefited a great deal by attending seminars and rubbing elbows with the movers and
shakers in our respective areas of expertise.
And once you’ve read all the books you could find, surfed the sites a dozen times, and read
all the articles you could find, you’re not done. That’s right you have to do it all over again
and again and again. Its one thing to achieve expert status, but it’s another to stay at the
top. Staying on the top of your game requires dedication to continuous learning.
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
That was a pretty long excerpt from my e-book that I wrote with Matt Bacak called
Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!, but it’s indicative of the type of information
you’ll get when you read the easy-to-follow, “paint-by-the-numbers” program in
Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=
So if you’re interested in establishing yourself as an expert quickly and easily, pick up our ebook and put our simple 30-Day plan to work for you…and profit for the rest of your life.
But…
If you’re not interested in doing “all the work” that’s involved in becoming an expert (trust
me, it’s not that much), you can use one of the other ways of creating a product.
Option #2. Create a product with another writer or partner
Whether it’s through doing a joint venture with an expert in your niche or finding a coauthor to help you put together your product, it’s not too hard to find willing and able
partners that are not at that master guru level. What’s the master guru level? These are the
men and women who are very well known in their niche and probably are on a speaking
circuit and have one or two products out already. To land a master guru and get them to c0write an e-book or book with you is highly unlikely because they’re running their business
and you’re going to have to really make the case for WHY they should create a product with
you: i.e., you have a huge list, you’re willing to do most of the writing, or you’ve already got
a ghost-writer lined up.
Interview Experts
Got an expert but they’re not exactly the writing type? No problem. If you’re working with
an expert in the field, it’s easy to just think up a list of questions (or post a survey on a
forum asking for help in coming up with questions or look at your list of common problems
your starving market have) and then ask your expert to respond via email or by phone to the
questions. Now you have your content.
There are a lot of professionals out there; lawyers, doctors, businesspeople, realtors,
dentists, business owners and so on that would love to create a product but don’t have the
time or know-how to do it. That’s where you come in. You’re the simple solution that
they’ve been looking for. How do you put together a JV proposal that will have experts
begging to do a JV with you?
Just take a look at “How to Become a Joint Venture Marketing Master,” the bonus e-book
that was included with your purchase of this manual. How to Become a JV Marketing
Master offers a straightforward plan for you to get JV partners. It will walk you through
everything from creating a proposal to negotiating a deal. It truly is a great e-book to have.
As you’ll learn in Teleseminar Magic, you can quickly and easily set up a teleseminar
with some expert, record the conversation, transcribe it and have it available for sale within
a week…or less! And if you don’t want to wait a week, you can pre-sell the product and
charge for the call and you could have money deposited in your bank account even before
you hold the teleseminar. Magic indeed ☺
This is the technique that first made Joe Kumar famous (or should I say infamous) with his
e-book. Later Shawn Casey used this same strategy to “write” his best-seller "Mining Gold
On the Internet: A Step-by-step Guide To Quick Cash Flow Online."
Is it really that easy? YES!
Super Tip/Major Pet Peeve of Mine – If you’re going to create products out of
teleseminars, spend the extra day or two to really go through the material and organize it
with headers, additional content, active links and chapter breaks. I’m sick and tired of
buying e-books that were transcriptions to teleseminars that are nothing more than a wordfor-word transcription of the teleseminar, complete with awkward language and nonsense
that I can’t learn anything from.
Using Existing Content
One more way to get a guru on board is to see if they’ll let you take some of their existing
content and include it as part of your e-book, book or homestudy course. Why would they
let you do this? Either because you’re going to give them a cut of the profits or they want
the additional FREE exposure or both!
Can you actually do this? As you’ll learn later in this e-book when you read my interview
with Yanik Silver, it’s very possible and very easy to do. Yanik used this very technique
when he created Autoresponder Magic and Million Dollar eMails. He just asked the
biggest gurus he could find for their messages in their autoresponder series and copies of
the emails they’ve sent out. And no, he wasn’t some huge industry insider at that point. He
was just getting going with Instant Sales Letters, but he came up with a killer sales letter
(go figure) to these gurus to get them on board.
Option #3. Have someone create the product for you
As a recovering e-book ghostwriter (someone who writes books and other materials for
others but the products are published under the buyer’s name), I know firsthand how
cheaply you can get someone to write an e-book for you. I finally learned that you can make
a lot more money by both creating and marketing your OWN products versus quickly
creating them for others to profit from.
How do you find a ghostwriter? Thanks to the power of the Internet, the process is very
simple. Just go to www.Elance.com which is a phenomenal site that will put you in touch
with freelancers offering all kinds of writing, editing and other services. The site is very
easy to use and
But it doesn’t stop there. You can get freelancers to write your book for you or even create a
piece of software for you or go to www.RentACoder.com and post your job request,
including what you need and how much you’re willing to pay. Then a bunch of freelancers
bid on your project, you accept a bid and your product could be in your hands in less than a
week. Yes, it can be that quick depending on the scope of a project.
Skeptical? Just hop on over to either of those sites and you’ll see that you can view samples
of some of the freelancers work, how others buyers have rated them and a lot more. It’s
absolutely a must-use resource for the lazy infopreneur (some would say SMART
infopreneur).
Option #4. Buy the rights to a product and market/sell it
Reprint or Resell rights to a product are a quick and easy way for you to start selling a wellestablished and profitable product. All that’s involved on your part is plunking down the
money to buy the rights, and then market the heck out of the product and your web-site.
This is exactly what I did with 33 Days to Online Profits. Messrs. Edwards and Silver
were kind enough create an awesome product and killer sales letter. All I had to do was pay
for the resell rights and I had a powerful product in my portfolio. The only think I have to
worry about is driving traffic to my site to sell the product. Actually, I promote 33 Days to
Online Profits as a FREE bonus for this product as well. So hopefully if you PAID for this
manual, you received it for FREE.
Again, all you have to do is find a killer product, buy the resell rights and promote the
product. You keep 100% of the profits if you buy the Gold resell rights. It’s that simple.
A method of purchasing resell rights that involves a little more work is through buying
reprint rights to say 200 to 500 reports that are on a single CD. You then have the option of
taking all that material, bundling it together into several different products and selling it to
your end user.
Now the one issue I have with going with option #4 is that you have to do a lot of work to
find great products and then buy the individual products with resell rights every month in
order to add new products to your stable. One easy solution is to use a service like Push
Button Publishing. The beauty of Push Button Publishing is that it comes with web
hosting, autoresponders, products, and a ton of resources you can use to create your own
products. It’s definitely worth looking into.
The Even Lazier Way!
Not even going the extra mile to resell other products, you can just promote other people’s
products and make money as an affiliate. Some super affiliates like Rosalind Gardner,
Ewen Chia and Andrew Fox are making big money selling other people’s products. But
where do you find the products to promote? Clickbank is one place, but also check out
the Affiliate Match Directory for more info on over 2,800 affiliate programs that are out
there. WOW!
Enough on that step. Let’s move to another “easy” way to make money without really
creating 100% of the product: Leveraging the Public Domain.
Option #5. Find information and products to market that are in the Public
Domain
The public what? The public domain, that’s what. When something is in the public domain,
it just means that the book or written material is now part of public property and is free to
be copied and distributed by anyone. Savvy internet marketers are scouring the web for
out-of-print and non-copyrighted material to market, all the while keeping 100% of the
profits from selling something they got for free on the Internet.
This method is just gaining acceptance or should I say “visibility” within the internet
marketing arena. But is it really that easy? Yes and No. Yes, all you have to do is write a
new foreword to the book or maybe bundle the book with a few bonuses, put up a web-site
and you’re in business. That’s a cakewalk compared to researching, planning, writing and
editing your own information product. However, it used to be a rule of thumb that if it was
X years after the author died or published before a certain date, you could be certain that
the material was in the public domain. That’s not the case anymore. You have to do your
homework and make sure that it definitely is public domain or else you’ll find yourself on
the wrong end of a lawsuit.
One caveat, most government documents and publications are available free of charge. This
means you get to copy the information word for word and sell the information as is or
incorporate it into one of your products. When you read 33 Days to Online Profits, you’ll
read about the story of Terry Dean who took a book called “Scientific Advertising” which
was in the public domain and added some of his own writing to it to create a product that he
now sells for $29.97. To see what he’s done to create a great product out of free
information, visit: www.MrMarketer.com
And if this method of creating products has peaked your interest, Yanik Silver just came out
with the definitive guide on the subject called Public Domain Riches that tells you
everything you need to know about finding, marketing and profiting from products you
didn’t even write or create.
Option #6. Chicken Soup It! - Get others to contribute to the project
I just came across this method this morning and had to add it to the list. My virtual mentor
Seth Godin of Unleashing the Ideavirus fame has done it again. At the end of 2003 he asked
various business owners to submit entries into his project. The project was to find the best
companies out there that can help create and develop Purple Cows. What are Purple
Cows? Well, it’s based on his book Purple Cows and I’m not going to tell you what they
are because it’s one little book that MUST be on your bookshelf.
The point is that he had all these companies, regular every day companies that weren’t big
names, throw their name in the hat to be part of this e-book Seth was putting together. A
little editing, a brief introduction, and the rest is content provided by other people. At the
time of this writing, you could get the download for free here:
http://www.sethgodin.com/bull/download.asp Now he’s giving it away free as a
promotional device, but why can’t you brainstorm ways to get others to contribute to your
project…for FREE!
Option #7. Transforming a raw product or data you bought
Huh? How do you buy a raw product and just what the heck is a raw product? Let me
explain. This is really a new concept and idea that Jimmy Brown first created with his
Profits Vault membership site. What Jimmy did was take a hot niche, research it and come
up with what he called a raw product. This was a rich text or Word file that had a very
simple e-book already done for you. All you had to do was repackage the e-book by adding
new content and data. Next you came up with a new title and cover and you had a product
that was ready for sale.
Jimmy then partnered with Ryan Deiss to come up with Nicheology. Nicheology is a
membership site that will provide you with a rich text file for 2 to 4 niches every month,
plus analysis on several key niches. The analysis will tell you how many people searched for
the keywords and the cost per click of advertising those terms. I recently joined because I
want to stay on top of all the latest products and services in the industry so that I could
report then back to you.
Jimmy and Ryan capped membership at 1,500 people and if you’re sitting there thinking
“How can I profit from a niche if 1,500 people suddenly jump in,” I can’t blame you. But I
quickly realized that only a handful of people take action. Only a handful of the members
are going to actually take the rich text file and go through it, edit it and come up with new
bonuses to add to the sales letter and so on. I’m busy creating one of my products right
now. So if you’ve signed up for the e-course that will take you through the next 30 days
([email protected]), then I’ll be sure to let you know how my product
comes along.
Now let’s get into creating your product…
Create Your Detailed Outline
I never start work on a project without having a detailed outline to write from or create
from. Creating a detailed outline to write from will help keep you on track and let you know
how much more writing you have to do. This point is so critical that I don’t allow any of my
writing clients that I coach to write unless they show me their detailed outline. Why am I
such a stickler on this point? Because I know from experience that if you have your outline
in front of you, it’s going to be relatively easy to quickly write or create your information
product.
When you have a detailed outline you must focus on your topic and what you want to write
about or create. This starts to stimulate you creative juices and helps you think about the
entire process and what you need to cover. Once you know what you want to cover and
when you want to talk about it, all that’s left to do is fill in the blanks.
Under each step in your system, you add the key points and items that you want to discuss.
Under each main heading, add 3 to 5 sub-headings and then your job is to write 2 to 3
paragraphs (or more) for each subheading. Don’t worry. When I say paragraphs, I mean 24 sentences per paragraph. Write in a conversational manner. We’re not talking thesisspeak here. We’re talking plain-speak so that you can communicate effectively with your
reader.
The goal is to just get your thoughts down on paper and “check all the boxes” on your
detailed outline. Then once you’re completely done, you can worry about filling in the
blanks. If you’re stumped, don’t know what to write and you’re “not feeling it” on a
particular day, don’t sweat it. Write in:
ADD MORE HERE
And move on to the next topic. The last thing you want to do is waste your precious time
trying to come up with the perfect word or sentence for a sub-heading.
Action-Oriented
I like to end my sections/chapters with action-oriented language. I try and compel my
readers to get off their butts and take action.
That includes you by the way!!! ☺
You want your readers to profit or solve their problems as a result of using your product, so
provide them with plenty of motivation, inspirational stories and easy-to-use information to
get them to take action and achieve the success they were looking for in the first place when
they decided to buy your product.
How Long Should It Be and What Color?
What color should your product be? That’s just as ludicrous as asking how long your e-book
or book should be. There are no standard guidelines, just rules of thumb. What’s the rule
of thumb? Look at what the competition is putting out and now you have your benchmark
against which to gauge your product. I’ve bought e-books that were 50 pages long and I’ve
bought some that were a mind-numbing 370+ pages long. The 50-pager is one of the best
I’ve ever written and the 374+ pager was a DOG. I got through half of it and they should
have written what they wrote in those pages on perhaps 24 pages. Yes, there was that much
CRAP in the e-book.
My point is that whether it’s an e-book, a book, a CD set or some other infoproduct, you
have to be concise and get to the point. People aren’t going to scream if you sell them a 50page e-book that’s packed to the brim with information. Joe Vitale sold an 11-page e-book
to start his career. Yes, you read that right 11 pages. Amazing and people loved it.
My point is to just make sure that you provide valuable content and you give people
information that they can use in their lives to improve their personal life and/or their bank
accounts. Save the prose for that Pulitzer Prize winning book you’ll write after you’re rich!
Just Get It Done
The most important thing I want you to take away from this section is to just get the darned
thing finished. As an e-book coach I run into many, many people who have a great idea for
a product and they’ve written half of it or two-thirds of it and they just never finish their
product. They’ve been sitting there doing more research or conducting more interviews and
days, then weeks, then months go by and they never complete their product.
If you don’t complete your product, you’ll never sell it and if you never put it up for sale,
you’ll never make any money from your efforts. It’s a simple chain of events.
Just get it done is my advice to you. If you have a blank spot in the e-book or book, just
forget about it for now. Mark it with ADD MORE HERE and move on. You fill in your ebook or information product AFTER it’s done and past the creation stage. Remember,
that’s what the editing stage is for or more precisely, what Step #3e – Polish Your Product is
for.
Instant Niche Product Technique – Change the Format of an Existing Product
One easy way to create a new niche product is to take an existing product you have and put
it into a new format. For instance you can take a book you wrote and add a new intro, cut it
down and make it into an e-book. Or you can take that book, divide it up into sections,
create a 30 minute to 60 minute audio for it and now you have an audio product. Or you
can take those sections, change the format of the pages and stick them into a 3-ring binder
and bundle it with the audio product and now you have a home study course. As you can
see, there are literally dozens of quick and easy ways to create products…instantly!
Some other formats you might look into using:
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Booklets
E-books
Books
Downloadable audio products
Audio products (CDs and Tapes)
DVDs and Videos
Streaming Online Video
Home Study Courses
Membership Sites
Teleseminars
Webinars and Webcasts
Coaching
Bootcamps
Consulting Services
Lazy or Should I Say Easy Way Out
Again, the purpose of this manual is to help you create, market and sell your own
information products. But if you’re looking to get started making money immediately on
the Internet, you should look into becoming an affiliate of some products from the big
names in the business. You’ll get access to the inner workings of how they respond to,
manage and promote their products. All of which you can “swipe” and save yourself
hundreds of hours trying to get your system live. To me that’s just a smart investment.
* Recommended Resources *
Third Sphere
www.1automationwiz.com
Clickbank
PayPal
Write it FAST! How to Write a Book in 30 Days…or less!
How to Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!
www.Elance.com
Push Button Publishing
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Step
Polish
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Standing Out in the Crowd
One thing I stress with all my coaching clients is that they have to absolutely positively, no
question about it put out a professional looking product. There is no excuse under the sun
that you can use as to why you cannot have a great looking product and a professional
looking web-site. Why is this so important?
Because the marketplace is so competitive and you’re going to need all the tools at your
disposal to make yourself stick out amongst the crowd. Simply put, when your product is
evaluated side-by-side with a similar product in your niche, you want yours to come out
ahead. And yes, buyers on the Internet do compare products. They don’t have an unlimited
budget and they’re going to compare your e-book on losing weight with 5 others before
making their decision.
There are a few main ways that you can immediately impact and improve the perceived
value of your product. We’re going to talk about the following in the next few steps after we
do a quick content edit on your e-book/book/product:
! Your Professional Looking Product
! Your Killer Web-Site
! Your Testimonials
Include your great domain name and Killer Title and you’ll be on your way to instant riches.
But before you go off counting your money before you’ve made it, let’s talk about doing a
quick content edit on your product.
Do Your Quick Content Edit First
Scroll through your e-book from start to finish and look for all those markers that you left in
it to remind yourself to add more information. You remember them. They look something
like this:
ADD MORE HERE
NOW is the time to go out and find the remaining information that you need to fill in the
blanks. Don’t kill yourself wasting hours and hours. If you’re having a big problem finding
unique content or writing your own, find an author who’s written an article on the subject
and insert it into your text. Make a note to email them and ask for permission and you’re
done.
Remember, don’t waste too much time doing your content edit. You don’t have to elaborate
too much when you’re writing e-books. Just get to the heart of the matter and don’t worry
about providing all the footnotes and backup to what you’re saying. You’re the expert,
remember? Your readers will take your word for it.
Okay, let’s get into step #3e, Polishing Your Product.
Polishing It
I go through this process in detail in The One Minute eBook. I think I devote several
pages to the subject in that e-book, but I’ll tell you how to do it right here in as little space as
possible because I don’t want to sidetrack you from getting your web-site up and running!
Get Your Model E-Book - Get yourself a model e-book or book or whatever type of
product you’re working on. By model I mean best in class for your category. Let’s pretend
you’re working on an e-book. Your next step is to take that model e-book and print out a
few pages. Then you go through your e-book and you try to format your borders, your font
and your spacing in the same style as the other e-book. Why borrow from the best?
Because this little tactic dramatically decreases the amount of time you spend on stupid
formatting issues.
Use Bullets and Lists – This helps to break up the endless stream of paragraphs. They
also act as mini headlines because they call attention to themselves. Bulleted items also
serve to reinforce the material in your paragraphs and they help break things up a bit and
give your readers eyes a break
The White Space Game - Where appropriate, add in an extra space between paragraphs
or subjects to make it easier to both read and keep two different thoughts, strategies and
ideas separate from one another. Use this technique selectively because you don’t want
your e-book to be considered a long special report that your customer overpaid for.
Keep it Consistent and Simple - If you’re using a 12point font in one chapter and you
use a 10-point font in another, you’re not being consistent. The same goes for your headers,
subtopics and other formatted areas of your e-book. When you’re consistent, your product
will look professional. And one more thing; don’t get fancy. Don’t get cute and don’t get
weird with your formatting. Create a clean-looking and easy to read product and your
customers will thank you…with their dollars and their referrals to their friends and
subscribers.
Killer Tip – Tell Some Stories
I attended a seminar put on by Mark Victor Hansen of Chicken Soup for the Soul fame and
there was one major “A-HA” that I had: Everyone loves stories. When you can tell a great
story that conveys the main strategy or system that you’re hawking, people are going to be
able to quickly and easily understand what you’re talking about and be able to identify with
you and your system. This is why Anthony Robbins tells the story of how he was broke and
38 pounds overweight. This is why Robert Kiyosaki tells you that he was broke and living
out of a Toyota. This is why Carlton Sheets tells you that he was downsized from his job and
didn’t have money for his first real estate deal.
Why do all these multi-millionaire infopreneurs share their life stories with you before
getting into their product pitches or the meat of their system? Because everyone loves a
great story and stories help to quickly communicate the information you have for sale. It
also helps give people that “carrot” to keep on reading. For help in learning how you should
integrate or use stories in your products, check out any Chicken Soup for the Soul book,
read Rich Dad Poor Dad by Robert Kiyosaki or visit the sales page at
www.MyFreedomCoach.com. I share my story with people in the sales letter and it’s
been compelling enough to get people to sign up for a pretty expensive coaching package.
A Jury of Your Peers
I highly recommend that you send out your e-book to a number of your peers within your
industry for their review. You do this to secure a quick blurb or testimonial for your e-book
that you can use on your web-site and in promotions for the e-book. Tell your peers to give
you an honest review of what they see and tell them to make suggestions to make the e-book
better. Tell them to be brutal if necessary and make recommendations for what to cut out
or what to tighten.
These individuals will act as your editors, critics as well as your typical reader. Since you
have chosen people who have written e-books before, you’ll get an honest critique about
your writing, your grammar and the content. They will help you by making suggestions on
what to cut out and where to add some more meat.
Once you’ve received their comments, thank them profusely and tell them you’ll send the
finished copy shortly. Then when you’ve spent a few days NOT WEEKS, you can send them
the file to review and ask them for a testimonial for the product, along with the web-site
they want “showcased” on your sales page for your e-book. More on this in a second.
Make sure you take the time though to incorporate their suggestions and changes. If
enough people are saying “chapter 3 is a little light” or “chapter 3 needs some work” you’d
better get cranking because chances are they’re right.
Don’t take it personally. While it might seem like it at this point, your e-book is not a part
of you. It’s a product, that’s all. Your job is to create the best product possible and get it to
market as quickly as possible. You want to create an e-book that people are going to love
and mention in news groups, discussion forums and their ezines…so take your peer
reviewers’ comments to heart and make the necessary changes.
Your bank account will thank you.
What’s In It For Them?
When you send a request to your peers and other gurus to give you a testimonial for your
product, you’ll get 99 out of 100 giving you a very favorable testimonial for your e-book.
Why? It’s the whole “What’s In It For Me” mentality. Your guru that you’ve reached out to
is now going to get exposure to everyone who visits your web-site AND if you give them first
crack at promoting your e-book through your affiliate program, they’ll make a LOT of
money from promoting YOU.
Don’t you just love being a published author? I know I do.
The Importance of Killer Testimonials
I touched upon this briefly, but wanted to hammer it home right now. In the Bonus section
of this e-book you'll find an interview I did with Yanik Silver where he touches briefly
upon the importance of testimonials for your sales letter, but more importantly,
testimonials help establish you credibility.
Credibility
You see, you can say anything you want about your product and yourself in your sales letter,
but there’s no credibility there. EVERYONE TALKS GREAT ABOUT THEMSELVES AND
THEIR OWN PRODUCTS. What you need is to have your customers or other gurus within
your niche talking about the SPECIFIC results that can be achieved by using your
products/services. More on this in a second.
So what you’re looking to do is put testimonials throughout your sales letters that speak to
how long you’ve been in business, the great results your clients have achieved and how
you’ve transformed people’s lives for a mere infoproduct worth $47.
SUPER TIP – By the way, another awesome thing that Yanik shared with me is the
importance of putting a PHYSICAL ADDRESS and PHONE NUMBER in your contact
information at the bottom of your mini-site.
Specific Results
It’s not enough for someone to say that your product helped them lose weight. You want
them to say 15 pounds in 2 weeks. You want them to say that they made an additional
$2,645 within 48 hours after putting into action just ONE of the ideas you shared with them
on the phone.
Relevance
Another thing Yanik told me that jumped out and hit me over the head was the importance
of relevancy. It’s not enough to be specific, but the testimonials have to be relevant and that
means that you don’t want to have a testimonial from a customer that talks about how quick
you were to respond to their email for help. “So what?” your potential visitors are going to
say if the main point you’re trying to make is how quickly you can make profits with your
system. It’s better to insert testimonials from satisfied customers that have SPECIFIC info
on how much money they made.
Where to Place Your Testimonials
Testimonials can be used in a variety of places:
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•
•
•
Home Page
Sales Letter
In Your Ezine
In Your Press Kit
And So On
Basically you can use them just about anywhere where you want to grab a reader’s attention
and increase your credibility. But of course, the most important place is on your sales letter.
Generally speaking you should have them spread out throughout your sales letter, but I
definitely like to throw in a quote toward the top of my sales letter, right after my headline.
Then I always make sure to put one near that last flurry of words before I tell people to
“BUY NOW!”
NEVER THROW ANYTHING AWAY
I NEVER throw any of my writing, notes or research away. NEVER. This is one of the
reason’s my wife can’t stand my office, but all joking aside, this is an important bit of advice.
Even if you think your writing or your interview or your recording SUCKS, just put it in a
filing cabinet or something. Just don’t throw it away.
Why should you be a pack rat?
Because that chapter you cast aside could become a bonus report for one of your e-books or
something you give away free on your site. Maybe a year from now it becomes part of a new
product you create.
And of course if you’ve found that you’ve written TOO MUCH, you can always cut down
your chapters or eliminate entire sections of a book for instance and use the material for the
second book in the series or publish it as an e-book. This is exactly what I’m doing with
some of the material that I wrote for The Secrets of Wealth. I had written too much on
three of the Secrets and just saved them on my computer. I plan on using the material for 3
different e-books. With a little more writing, some extensive editing and some polishing I
should have 3 e-books created in a few weeks. Not bad for something that would have
ended up “on the cutting room floor.”
How Do You Know When You’re Done Editing?
You’re done editing when you’re 90 percent done. I’m serious. The best advice I ever got
from self-publishing guru Dan Poynter is that your book is completed when it’s 99 percent
done. What happened to the other 9 percent? I’ll show you how you can get some other
people to edit your book for you and take care of that pesky 9 percent…for FREE.
But you’ll have to wait a few minutes, because I want to make sure you’re not going to try
and publish crap. Yes, CRAP!!!
Don’t Publish Crap
At the beginning of this e-book I said that anyone could write an e-book and that’s a
problem. The “problem” piece is that thanks to the low-cost of entry and lack of being able
to browse the product before purchasing it, a number of hacks and awful writers are putting
out…well, crap. They don’t take the time to research their material and they go out, maybe
interview some people via email or take a bunch of articles and string them together and
charge $27 for it. Someone buys it, is horrified that they wasted the money and they don’t
want to buy e-books from “no-names” any longer. This is why it’s so hard to build your ebook business without the help of some joint-venture partners.
The reason for our rant here is to just push you to make sure you write and create only
quality products. You’ll not only help yourself (word will get out about your e-books), but
you’ll help that next budding guru by upholding a standard in publishing, i.e., people aren’t
going to be afraid of buying their product – sight unseen.
The “HOLY CRAP” Factor
I learned this great piece of advice from Armand Morin, creator of too many products to
mention, but most notably Audio Generator. He says:
“The holy crap factor works this way. When a person first sees your
product and/or service the first two words out oft heir mouths should
be “holy crap.” When they first start utilizing your product again the
first two words should be “holy crap.” When the person starts receiving
our follow up emails and anything that comes from you they should be
saying “holy crap.” And the reason why they should be doing this is that
you want to just bring this person into a shocked state. Meaning, do
something that’s totally different than everyone else is doing.”
What’s the importance of the HOLLY CRAP Factor? In a word you’re going to be different.
You’re going to be going the extra mile for people. You’re going to stick out and people are
going to remember you. Your products are going to be simple and very easy to use and thus
very VIRAL. People are going to talk about you and refer their friends and anyone else who
will listen to your web-sites. Strive to put the HOLY CRAP Factor to work for you and you’ll
have a very profitable product on your hands!
On The Other Hand, Don’t Go Overboard!!!
Something that we’ll cover again, but is worth mentioning here is to just get it going. By
that I mean that at some point you have to STOP tweaking and editing and polishing your
information product and just get it out there. Dan Poynter, the self-publishing guru likes to
say that books are done when they’re 95% complete and 100% factual. As long as your facts
are straight and the majority of the editing is done…get it out there. Get your web-site up
and running and test the product by driving traffic to the site. You’ll always be able to
change, edit, morph and re-invent your information product after it’s for sale to the public.
Of course you might not want to. Let me explain.
I’ve bought several e-books from some well-known infopreneurs and I’ve found dozens of
spelling mistakes, bad grammar and bad links. Some of these e-books have been out there
for 5 to 7 years. You’d think they’d have taken a look at their e-books since the launch and
edited them or updated them. But they don’t. Why? Because it just doesn’t matter.
They’re providing great content, in a useful format and people can profit from putting the
information into action.
You should strive for the same attitude. Remember, you don’t have to get it right, you just
have to get it going. Don’t catch the Perfection Paralysis disease. Get your information
product to where it’s “good” and put it up for sale. You can tweak it and make it “perfect”
after you’ve cashed several large checks. We’ll talk more about testing your product in a
later step, but for now let’s talk about pricing your product.
Pricing Your Product
Before we get into the cover design, let’s talk briefly about price. We’ll talk about it later,
but it’s what Willie Crawford calls the “Twenty Dollar Ebook Syndrome.” The first
thing you should do is find out what your competition is charging. When you were doing
your market research, you likely came across a number of competitive web-sites and
products. List out what they’re charging and you’ll soon know what the maximum you can
charge (as well as the minimum, not that you want to go there).
Don’t Price Your Product Too Low
You should not price your product at the low end of the spectrum! Why? Because it’s buyer
psychology working against you. They’ll ask themselves why your product is so cheap
compared to everyone else’s. So either price it at the high end or middle of the road, but
NEVER at the low end.
Besides, when you price your product at the high end, you are making that much
more per sale, i.e., a fatter profit margin. So if you were contemplating charging $17,
but opted for $37 and it still sells at the same rate, you can sell almost twice as less at the
high price and still make the same amount of profit. If you happen to sell the same number
of products, you’re making $20 more per transaction. Now that’s smart pricing.
If you’re not sure what to charge, you can always test various price points to see what
consumers are willing to pay. There are a variety of methods that you can employ to figure
out the price you should be charging. My favorite is to just ask your potential customers
what they would be willing to pay for your product. Yes, it can be that simple.
I did a simple little survey to my list to find out how much they’d be willing to pay for my
coaching services. They told me and I compared it to the other products and services of my
competitors and came up with my fees. The whole process took 2 days to do. Another
option is to figure out what the lowest price you can sell you product for and still make a
decent living/extra income from and work UP from there. So if you figure based on your
conversion rates and estimated traffic that you can charge $17 per e-book, then you know
that’s the bare minimum you could charge (not that you’d ever want to charge that LITTLE
for your e-books).
We’ll talk more about conversion rates and how to calculate how much you can make and
need to make monthly in a few pages from now, but first let’s talk about doing a little more
testing. You could do more advanced testing by doing what’s called A/B split tests where
half the respondents go to one page and the other half go to the other. The only difference
is the price. You’ll be surprised by the results.
You Can Always Go Up
By the way, if your product is selling like hotcakes, you can always bump up the price. This
way you’ve got a proven winner of a product and you’ll be making more per transaction.
Just note that while you can go up, you’re going to piss off quite a few people If you reduce
your price. Another strategy to use is to price your product low, but when the customer
goes to check out, you immediately try to upsell them to the same product, but perhaps with
an added “exclusive” bonus if they buy today. We’ll talk about how you do this later on
when we discuss filling out your infoproducts funnel.
The Purely Mathematical Approach to Pricing
Of course there is another way to figure out what you should be charging and that’s to work
backwards from the profit you want per month and the number of visitors you get to your
site. We’ll talk about how to calculate the price using this method in just a few moments.
First let’s talk about your product’s packaging.
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Your Professional Looking Product
It always amazes me that people don’t spend a little money to make a lot more money. They
don’t spend the $150 it costs go get a great looking product cover made by a graphics
professional. Instead they use their Adobe Photoshop or some other product and create
their cover and web-site banner by themselves. Not only is that a major rookie mistake, but
they’re leaving a lot of money on the table. Let me explain.
Just look at your own buying behavior. If you had the option of buying only one e-book, but
you could choose between two products, which would you choose? Here’s what they look
like:
Write It FAST!
How to Write,
Publish and
Make a Lot of
Money from
Your E-Book!
This could
be YOU!
Okay, so it’s an extreme example and hopefully you’re laughing, but this is exactly what I
see on the Internet every single day. You’ve got someone who’s run 99 yards down the field
and they stop at the one yard line. They don’t take the plunge and finish the job.
Get yourself a favor and get a pro cover and product designer. I use Max Covers for my
designs and he’s been great. Don’t take the cheap way out. A cover like the one on the left
will outsell the one on the right 10 to 20 times to 1 every day of the week. Don’t leave money
on the table.
Which takes us to the next step in the process of looking professional; creating your killer
web-site.
Max over at Max Covers and just about any good cover designer is going to include a web
page header in the price for your designing your cover.
ECover Generator
Or if you’re a little graphically inclined, you can use a simple software solution that will help
you create thousands of e-book, newsletter, DVD, CD, software and other information
product covers in just a few short minutes. I’m talking about Armand Morin’s E-Cover
Generator. If you’re the “hands on” type and are a little tech savvy, then this might be a
great option for you.
S
tep ##4a
4a –– P
l an Y
our B
ackend
Step
Plan
Your
Backend
How to Create Multiple Streams of Income
(off the same information)
This e-book’s title does have an “S” at the end of it, as in multiple products. My goal is to
help you instantly create your first product and get you running toward creating a second
and a third product…in record time. Why create several products quickly?
Because, if you were paying attention a short while ago, you want to up-sell your customers
and you want to bring them into your infoproducts funnel. That’s where you’re going to
make the money, in the back-end, and you DO want to make money, don’t you?
Of course you do, which is why you have to plan your backend before you market your first
product. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Let’s cover the basics first.
The Profit is in the Back-End
Up to now you’ve probably been making some money selling e-books or books to your list of
subscribers. Perhaps you’ve had some success and made some money, but that’s about to
change. You’re about to learn the secrets that all gurus know: the profit is in the back-end.
What’s the Back-End?
Back-end is just the term for sales that happen after the initial sales you make to your new
customer. I’m going to show you exactly how you can create a passive income stream for
yourself by creating dozens of products off of the same core product that you sell.
I’m going to be sharing with you what’s called an Infoproducts Funnel and it’s going to
be something that you’re going to want to print out and post prominently either in your
bathroom or by your computer so you can see it every day and remind yourself to “fill out
your funnel” to really make big money.
Information Products
But to step back a second and define what we mean by infoproducts, it’s nothing more than
a shortened version of two words: information products. Infoproducts are any product that
you can sell under the sun. They include everything from ezines, newsletters, books,
ebooks, CDs, audio cassette courses, videos, one-on-one coaching, bootcamps, and
seminars to name a few.
Repackaging the Same Old Stuff
If you look closely at any established guru out there, they’ve got a full lineup of products
that they can offer you. More than likely, a lot of the information that’s in their $20 book is
also repeated in their $497 home study course and that’s the trick. You can essentially
repackage the same information in a different form of media and make more money…from
the same customers!
You see, if you create raving fans, they’re going to want your information in book form, in
CD form so they can listen to you on the way to work, and they’ll want to see you live so they
can get the latest information and get a chance to ask you a question.
Is That “Right” to Do?
Is it wrong to push products on people that are essentially the same recycled stuff? NO, it’s
not. Because it’s not simply recycled stuff. All the way up your ladder to your bootcamp
product, you’re adding more bells and whistles. You’re including freebies they wouldn’t get
if they only bought your book and that’s it. When they purchase your ebook, you’re giving
them links they can use for additional products that can help them. When you give them a
CD set, now they have the material in a format they can listen to over and over again to help
reinforce what you’re teaching them. When they see you live, they get to feel the passion
and the energy. They get to network with like-minded people and maybe set up a joint
venture or two.
In short, you’re delivering more and more value as someone moves down your funnel.
Don’t believe us? Well just read what Infopreneur Willie Crawford has to say about it:
Don't Get Infected By The Twenty Dollar Ebook Syndrome
Copyright 2003-2004 by Willie Crawford
Making sales of one thousand dollars or more in your internet business is absolutely
intoxicating. It really drives home the point that you can make a nice living working from the
comfort of you own home running your own internet-based business. That feeling, sadly, is
also something that the majority of internet marketers have never experienced!
At my recent Internet Marketing How To Workshop, several speakers admonished
attendees, not to get stuck selling just twenty dollar e-books. We all reflected upon how it
felt the first time we checked our email and saw that we had an order and had just earned
twenty dollars. We admitted that this use to get us excited. However, we also had to move
beyond that point, we had to shift our thinking to greater possibilities if we were going to
earn a full-time living from the internet.
Study any successful internet marketer and you will see that he offers a range of products
at different price points. That's what I do. My least expensive product is $9.97 and my most
expensive product is currently $2495. In between I offer audiotapes at $197, videotapes at
$297, and consulting at $250 per hour. I offer this range, because different people want the
information I offer in different formats. Different people learn best according to how their
brains are wired.
Some people prefer learning by listening to audiotapes.
Some people prefer learning by watching videotapes.
Some people learn best by actually practicing and doing it. They need to attend workshops
or actual classes, although these can be virtual classes too.
Some people understand best when you explain it to them on the phone or via email. They
need the two-way interaction to fully clarify points.
Some people prefer to print something out and read it. I am a reader who will read the
same book several times if it contains really good information... absorbing something more
with each reading. I also have tons of audio and videotapes though.
As an information product marketer, your task is to offer your product in as many different
forms as possible so that you don't overlook any segment of the market. You should offer
ebooks, printed books, course, CDs, and all of the other forms. The amazing thing is that
this in NOT that hard. If you've already written an ebook, it's easy to be interviewed on the
topic and turn this into a marketable recording. It's easy to package the audiotapes and
transcripts, plus some additional notes, into a three-ring binder and call it a course. It's easy
to organize your notes and then physically teach the material either at a workshop, over the
internet, or even at a local community college.
The thing I see too many beginners get trapped into is creating a great ebook on a topic
they know a lot about. They check to see what similar ebooks sell for and choose $19.95 or
$29.95 as the price. Then they settle back and watch the sales roll in. These sales may be
a slow but steady trickle, which satisfies many people. It's thrilling to do the work once and
generate a continuous income stream from it. It's somewhat intoxicating. However, the
writer also becomes infected with the twenty dollar ebook syndrome and never tries to
create anything higher priced. He reasons that his market has shown him that they want,
and will buy, twenty dollar products. He's afraid to risk offering them something more
expensive.
How do I know lots of authors get infected with this ailment? I talk to and email them every
day. When I suggest to them that they need to create a $97 product or a $297 product, they
tell me that their customers can't afford these products. I have news for them! Their
customers are buying these products. They are just buying them from your competition.
They tell me their customers won't spend a thousand dollars for a seminar seat. I have
news for them, their customers are spending two thousand dollars for a seminar seat, they
are just buying from the competition. Your competitors are earning $500 commissions ... I
do regularly.
The purpose of this article today is to prevent you from falling victim to this "syndrome."
Consider this. If you sell one $297 audio product and make $200 or more profit, you've just
earned more than if you had sold ten $20 products and made 95% profit. And you've only
had to deal with 1/10th the potential customer service issues. And you've only had to
process one transaction. And believe, it or not, that sale was probably just as easy ...
maybe easier.... than the $20 sale.
One other insight I'll share with you - people who buy higher ticket items seem less prone to
complain or request refunds. They are people of action, so they buy the product, use it, and
get the results they sought. Many who buy twenty dollar products are looking for some
magic solution or all-encompassing answer for only twenty dollars, and that doesn't exist.
Part of that expectation is admittedly due to the hype used to sell the $20 products. We
condition our prospects to expect something for nothing... and in the process sabotage our
success.
So your job for the next few days is to plan out how you are going to convert your twenty
dollar product or idea into something much bigger.
No excuses, just do it :-)
***************************************************************************************************
Willie Crawford has been teaching others how to build an on-line business since late 1996.
Frequently featured in radio, magazine and newspaper articles and interviews, Willie
teaches the average guy what the top marketers are doing but seldom talking about. Willie
provides detailed how to information in his newsletter, through his personal coaching, and
at his annual how to workshop. Learn more at:
http://InternetMarketingHowToWorkshop.com
***************************************************************************************************
In short, you need to create infoproducts at all levels of the price scale.
Why You Need Infoproducts (and lots of them)
We’re going to get to the infoproducts funnel in a second, but we wanted to make sure that
you understand the importance of this step in the whole process of becoming a master
expert. If you sit there and you’re only selling a book to your customers, then you’re leaving
a lot of money on the table. If you only have a book you’re like 99% of the other would-be
gurus that are on the 1 yard line, but haven’t pushed the ball into the end zone. Make that
the PROFIT end zone.
If you want to score more profits, just make more products. Why? Because you want to be
able to give away some free stuff to get people into your funnel. Then you want to offer
them your book for $20. Then perhaps it’s an e-book for $37 or $47. Next it’s a CD set for
$97 and so on and so on until you’re offering them a bootcamp for $3,000.
Fill Your Funnel
Quickly with
Quality Leads
Using Different
Means
that Best
Fred Gleeck’s
Funnel
System
Fill Your Funnel As
Quickly & Inexpensively
As Possible
(Start with the
Least Expensive
Ones First)
Suit
Your
Skills
99% of All Authors, Speakers
and Consultants Concentrate
Only in This Area
Y
O
U
1%
Use an
Automated System
to Trade People
Up the Ladder
(www .w ebmarketingmagic.com)
<$10
Reports (7-10 pages)
$10-30 Your Book
Must Have Bouncebacks
w w w.selfpublishingsuccess.com
$50
2 Cassette Audio
$100
Monthly Newsletter
$200
6 Cassette Audio
$300
1 Day Seminar
$400
Videos
$500
$600
$700
Combination
of
Other Items
$800
$900
Items in The Funnel
are only suggested
possible products
and prices.
OTHER PRODUCTS:
eBooks, CDroms
Audios, Videos
Seminars, Bootcamps
Teleseminars
(www.telephonebridgesavers.com)
Bootcamp
$1000 Your Whole Enchilada
SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS
(www.speeking.com)
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
HIGH END CONSULTING
(www.consultingexpert.com)
Your Holy Grail:
Capture the Greatest Number of Opt-In Emails
YOU Can Make DOUBLE or TRIPLE What the Average Author/Speaker/Consultant Makes!
© Fred Gleeck 2001
Fred Gleeck Productions ! 1-800-FGLEECK ! 209 Horizon Peak Drive ! Henderson, NV 89012 ! [email protected]
(Graphic layout by Ken Robertson Productions 904-806-3193)
Plan Your Back-End BEFORE You Start Selling Stuff
This is CRITICAL. Don’t make the mistake we made which was to create a newsletter and
then flop around for a few years before we had products to sell and a fat infoproducts
funnel. You MUST plan your back-end BEFORE you do anything else.
YOU MUST HAVE A VISION OF WHERE YOU WANT TO GO
BEFORE YOU TAKE THAT FIRST STEP!!!!
We can’t stress this enough. Take the time to do the exercise of coming up with various
product ideas that will ensure that you have a product along each of the stages of the
infoproducts funnel.
Not Sure What to Create? ASK THEM
One of the easiest ways to figure out what your current list of subscribers wants is to simply
ask them. Why not send out a quick survey to your subscribers telling them that you’re
struggling between giving them an e-book or a CD set. Tell them what you’re thinking of
charging and what material you’re thinking of including.
You’ll be surprised at the responses you get. Very surprised.
Sometimes you’ll have subscribers literally creating the product outline and format for you.
All you have to do is fill in the blanks and you can have a product in days!!!!
And surveys are just one of the ways that you can create products. So what are the different
types of products you can create? There are dozens of them.
The Funnel System – Examples of Products in Your Pipeline
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Booklets
Newsletters (free and paid)
CDs
Special Reports
More Books
Videos
Seminars
One-on-One Coaching
And more….
If you create a product for each of the categories above, you’ll have created yourself a miniempire in your niche. You’ll have the products that people want and are desperately
searching for. With this arsenal of products, you will become the “go to” expert. Go to
experts get paid big bucks for speaking at seminars, coaching people one-on-one, and for
helping people at bootcamps and weekend events.
A Little Help with Your Infoproducts Funnel
You might be a bit overwhelmed if you’re staring at that funnel and you don’t know about
any of the products besides books and e-books. The truth is once you have the knowledge in
your head; it’s very easy to transform a book, e-book, or just the information in your head
into many different information products.
Special Reports
These are nothing more than documents ranging from a couple of pages to 20 to 30 pages.
The sell price is usually in the range of $4 to $20 per report. They can be delivered
electronically or by snail mail. Check out self-publishing guru Dan Poytner’s site for an
example of a guy who is making a killing off of special reports:
www.Parapublishing.com
Tips Booklets
One step up from special reports are booklets. Sold only as physical products, these
booklets are usually for under $10 and they make great giveaways or premiums at your
seminars. Paulette Ensign is the queen of booklets. Visit her site at
www.TipsBooklets.com to see how she does it.
Workbooks
This is a no-brainer if you’ve already written a book or even an e-book on a subject. You
simply create a workbook that someone can use to learn how to apply the information in
your other infoproducts. Everyone from Brian Tracy to Anthony Robbins has done this.
Now you can sell the workbook as a standalone product or you can package it with your
book and audiotapes to create a very high-end ticket product.
David Bach did a great job in packaging his Finish Rich Workbook out of the same
material found in his Smart Couples Finish Rich and his Smart Women Finish
Rich books. Then he went on to create his bestselling book The Automatic Millionaire
that landed him on Oprah in early 2004. The material in this sensationally titled book is
probably 95% from his other books. Bach definitely is a savvy marketer that knows how to
reuse the same material to create additional products!
Audio Version of Your Book/eBook
This is another no-brainer and it’s a great way to create another product quickly using
information you’ve already created. You can simply take sections of your book and cut them
down or expand upon them, then get into a recording studio and talk your way to riches.
Actually, these days you don’t even have to leave the comfort of your own home. Thanks to
the advancements made in recording devices, you can just pick up an mp3 player and
record yourself then download the mp3 to your computer. From there you can burn the
file(s) onto CDs and print out some labels and covers and you’re done. Now you’ve got a
$24 to $48 product on your hands.
Again, it’s not too difficult to do this….really. Don’t worry so much about the sound quality
and don’t be a perfectionist. Just get it going and get that next product created and out the
door. Mike Litman’s done a great job with his audio series based on his Conversations with
Millionaires book and an even better look is his How to Make Money on Demand product.
www.MakeMoneyOnDemand.com
Videos
And taking the audio format a little further, you can produce a line of videos based on the
same subject matter as your e-book or book. You can even charge for copies of your live
seminars. That’s right. You can videotape yourself on stage at some event you’re holding,
and then sell the videotapes for anywhere from $49 to $297 depending on the number of
days and the number of bonuses and other materials you include with the package. Talk
about getting paid multiple times for the same material!
You can even videotape yourself doing your workout, fixing your car, coaching baseball or
whatever it is you’re doing and make it into a product. Forget the big budgets and get rid of
the mindset that you have to have slick and fancy covers and other materials. Sure those
things help, but the main thing you need is great information and a great hook to sell your
product.
Teleseminars
Teleseminars are nothing more than giant conference calls where you can mute out
everyone else and talk about topics within your niche. Everybody from Mark Victor Hansen
of Chicken Soup for the Soul fame to Mike Litman are doing them these days. And
everybody else will be doing teleseminars in the next few months and definitely by next
year. The profits are just so huge. We suggest you start out with free teleseminars, build
your audience base, then move up to paid teleseminars. People are charging $20-$39 per
teleseminar that lasts anywhere from one hour to two hours and beyond. A great resource
to learn more about teleseminars is: www.TeleseminarMagic.com
Audio Version of Your Teleseminar
Want to talk about really stretching and recycling the same old stuff! Some marketers are
either charging for access to teleseminars or giving it away free, but recording the calls and
selling the files on CDs. As an added bonus they’re throwing in the transcripts from the call
in an ebook format. Pretty slick stuff and they’re charging anywhere from $27 to $49 per
seminar depending on who’s the guest speaker.
Again, for more details check out www.TeleseminarMagic.com
Paid Newsletters
We don’t do them, but we know a few gurus who are making a killing from charging
anywhere from $24 a year all the way up to $297 and beyond for the privilege of receiving
their words of wisdom either electronically or via snail mail. If you’re going to attempt this
you’d better have some quality content, loads of freebies you can give away to add value for
your subscribers or else you’ll get a lot of people canceling their subscriptions on you. Your
efforts will be rewarded if you do create a great product. Getting just 100 subscribers to pay
$49 a year will mean close to $5,000 extra revenue. Not bad for a little extra work.
Paid “Members Only” Web-Sites
Taking the previous product to the next level, you can have a “for pay” site. The concept is
similar: great content, downloads, freebies and more that people can’t get on your regular
site. In addition you can offer free teleseminars, previews of your new products, exclusive
interviews and so on and so on. Before you jump on the “for pay” web-site bandwagon
make sure you can offer value for your subscribers. There putting up good money
(anywhere from $9.99 to $49 a month) so your stuff really needs to be good.
Corey Rudl has taken the membership site business to the next level. Check out his site at:
Secrets to their Success
Seminars
We haven’t gotten to them yet, but you’ve probably guessed already that seminars can mean
big money, mainly because of the back-of-the-room sales. Seminars are a great way to
interact with your fans and convert them into big-time buyers by proving that you have the
solutions to their problems or that your system can help them get more of something in life;
usually money, time or both.
The absolute best way to “get your feet wet” and learn how a seminar works is to attend
several yourself, but you need to participate in them as often as possible as well. There are
speaking associations and seminar companies all across the world. For instance, The
Learning Annex is one seminar company that holds a lot of seminars in my local market. I
have attend a lot of courses throughout the years and I’ve learned a lot about how other
infopreneurs conduct and plan their seminars. And if I ever want to take it to the next level,
I can call The Learning Annex up and see if I can teach my own class for them.
Coaching
If you have the confidence in your abilities and your expertise, coaching is an absolutely
FABULOUS/MUST HAVE product to roll out. And yes it’s a product that has to be
priced, marketed, researched and planned before you can make any money from selling
your services. You can offer your coaching as a one-on-one service or you can do it via
group teleseminars, like I did with my first coaching program.
What should you coach people on? The sky’s the limit. You can coach people on anything
and everything that you’re good at. The one caveat is: that there is a starving crowd ready to
pay you and pay you well for your coaching services. The best part is that you don’t have to
tie yourself down to one or two niches. If there’s somebody out there that will pay you for
help with creating an infoproduct and another who wants help writing a sales letter, then
you can easily coach both of them. I have several coaching programs that I offer: e-book,
book, niche product creation and financial freedom coaching.
As I mentioned, my first infoproduct (besides my two books) was a coaching program. You
can see what I’ve done at www.MyFreedomCoach.com
Bootcamps
Ahhh….probably the most profitable product you can sell. This is where you charge a flat
fee for a weekend event at the location of your choice (usually your hometown). You have a
small group of people that are paying anywhere from $2,000 to $5,000 to be there and
learn directly from you. Bootcamps are usually reserved for the master gurus, but that
doesn’t mean you can’t do one if you’ve got your act together and you have a highly defined
niche. John Burley makes a ton of money doing these every few months. Visit him at
www.JohnBurley.com
Systems And Beyond
Software programs, subscription services, autoresponders, copywriting services and other
types of services are just a few of the different type of other products that you can create to
make big cash…FAST! You can create a service or a business out of almost ANY PRODUCT.
Yes, any product. Wrote an e-book on how to write an e-book? How about providing a
soup to nuts service that will take your clients manuscript, format it, design the cover,
publish it and promote it. Now that’s a service I should get into. Hmm…
Bronze, Silver and Gold
No, I’m not talking about the Olympics. I’m talking about the various versions of the same
product that you can sell to people. In my eyes this is a kind of variation on the immediate
up-sell. The bronze level is say your basic e-book with 3 or 4 bonuses. The Silver Level is
the e-book, 2 additional bonuses and an audio file. The Gold Level is everything the Silver
Level has but includes resell rights and an extra special “Quick Start” report or something.
The Bronze Level would cost $27, the Silver would run you $47 and the Gold would cost you
$97.
An extra $20 to go from Bronze to Silver isn’t much and you’ll get enough to go for the
Silver to make it worth the effort to put these levels together. Plus you’ll get the serious
spenders to go for the Gold (has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?) and you make an extra $70 for
adding a few extra items to the pot. Plus if people go for the gold, you’re going to have your
customers go out there and promote your product and more importantly, your name.
The Lazy Infopreneur’s Path to Riches
So that’s just a few of the different products that you can create on your own or with others,
but for you lazy infopreneurs who don’t want to work too hard, you can always focus on #3 #5 on the list of ways to create products:
Okay, enough about what products you could be creating. Let’s talk about planning for
them.
Plan Your “Backend” Before You Write Your Book
I said it before, but I’ll say it again so you MAKE SURE YOU DON’T MAKE A MAJOR
MISTAKE. I urge you to take the time to print out the funnel I showed you and/or take out
a blank sheet of paper and start crafting your own funnel. Ask yourself:
What products are missing from my funnel?
What’s the next higher- or lower-priced item in the funnel that I can create?
Pricing Your Products
Now for the fun part – pricing your products. Most budding gurus UNDERESTIMATE
THE WORTH OF THEIR INFORMATION. They underestimate the quality of the product
they are putting out and they pick a price tag that’s less than they are worth; not to mention
the information. If you start out in this business by pricing your products for peanuts,
you’re going to attract quite a few buyers but there’s a downside to this practice. You might
be clogging up your mailing list with people who are nothing more than thinly veiled
FREEBIE SEEKERS.
You DO NOT want FREEBIE SEEKERS ON YOUR LIST!!!
Let’s clarify that. You don’t want people who are only looking for free stuff and will NEVER
shell out money for information. You do want people who are window shopping, but have
bought stuff in the past from others and may one day buy from you. Understand the
difference? Good.
Now the first type of freebie seeker, the kind that will never buy, are not good for your
funnel and will only delude you into thinking you have an active and big list of buyers.
You’re looking for people that are willing to pay you good money for your services. You
don’t get that by selling $17 e-books or $5 tip booklets. Sure you can create quite a nice
business for yourself, but you’ll find it harder to crack into the big time as an infopreneur.
On the other hand, you don’t want to be known as someone who’s peddling e-books that
don’t deliver on their sales pages or selling books that don’t deliver what you said they
would on the back cover or introduction to the book. You must strive to OVER DELIVER
ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS!
This is how you build a loyal base of RAVING FANS!!!
So you can’t charge peanuts for your products, but you can’t start charging $5,000 for a
bootcamp either. What are you going to do?
Set up different pricing levels for different types of products, that’s what. Before we finish
off our conversation on pricing, let’s talk about your funnel.
Pricing Levels for Every Purse and Pocket
When you create free giveaways with the offer to sign up for your newsletter, you’re main
concern is to get people into your funnel. This is why you NEED to give stuff away. Then to
convert them into buyers, perhaps you offer them a $5 or $7 tips booklet or you offer them a
$5 discount off of your “best-selling” book. Then you offer your $37 or $47 e-book that
shows them how to improve some area of their life.
Perhaps you’ll create a CD set that accompanies your book or maybe you’ve recorded one of
your live seminars and you’re selling the DVD for a fraction of what it would cost to attend
the event live.
From there you sell them a years worth of electronic (and phone) coaching or a paid
teleseminar with you and some of your guru friends. The next level might be a seminar that
you give yourself or perhaps you’re part of a larger group of speakers. Then it’s on to
bootcamps and beyond.
There are endless possibilities and all along the way you have tiers of products that are
priced at different levels. Your job is to bring in as many prospects as possible into that
funnel then overdeliver at each level or tier so that they will feel compelled to make it to the
next level.
How do you compel them to the next level?
You give them what they want…and MORE, that’s how.
Freebies are Important
It’s important to have some things that you give away to people. Why? To get them into
your funnel. But you want the type of freebie seekers that will eventually buy something,
not just the people looking for “something for nothing” and will NEVER pay for anything.
Okay, so we’re beating that one to death. Let’s move on.
Now once the people are in your funnel you can actively work to convert them into buyers.
This is why Robert Kiyosaki, Tony Robbins, and other big names in this business give away
free tapes at their seminars and why some marketers on the internet have started to offer
everything but the kitchen sink just to get you on their list. They’re doing it because they
know that once they have your name and your email address, they can work on converting
you into a buyer.
Speaking of converting……...
How Much Money Will You Make?
SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!!!
That’s what you’re probably screaming right now. I feel where you’re coming from. So how
much money can you make from this niche of yours? A LOT is the simple answer, but it’s a
little more complicated.
From a 20,000 feet perspective, the amount of money you make will depend on:
Your sexy title
The perceived value of your product
How unique your product is
How big your hungry crowd is (remember, you always need a starving crowd)
How well your sales letter pulls
Your Sexy Title
A sensational title will grab the attention of someone. Tie your title into the main benefit of
the product and the main benefit your market is looking for, then you’ll force people to click
over to your web-site to find out more. This is what some people have said my product
Write It FAST! has done. Then the sub-title really hammers the benefit of the product
home.
Perceived Value of Your Product and How Unique it Is
If your product is geared toward a hungry market and the market has money to spend, you
can make a lot of money. But exactly how much you can charge and how many units you
sell is going to depend on what the perceived value of your product is.
If your e-book is on how to make money on the internet and you’re basically saying the
same stuff that’s been said in 14,275 e-books before you, you’re not going to sell many (if
any) units. Now if you focus on a hot niche that has little competition when you launch it,
you’re going to be selling thousands of copies per month. This is why Rosalind Gardner’s ebook “The Super Affiliate Handbook: How I Raked In $436,797 Online Last Year
Selling Other People’s Stuff” was such a success.
With hundreds of thousands of affiliates out there making chump change and barely
enough to pay the electricity bill, there was a ton of people wanting to learn the secrets of
this amazing woman and how she made $436,797 in just a year selling other people’s
products.
How Big Your Hungry Crowd Is and How Well Your Sales Letter Pulls
I’m not going to waste your time reiterating what I’ve already told you about these two
items. If you don’t know what I mean by them by now, you have two options: go back and
re-read the sections or put down this e-book right now and pick up a remote control or go
surf the net.
Exactly How Much Per Month Can You Make?
So I gave you the quick answer of how much other people are making, but how about YOU
in particular. Well, the amount of money you make is dependent on three things:
⇒ Your traffic to your web-site
⇒ Your Conversion Rate
⇒ Your Product’s Price
Your Traffic
This is easy enough to find out. Your web-host, if they’re any good, will have a section that
you can go into and look at your web-site statistics. You can track how many hits you’re
getting, where people come from (search engines, by entering in your URL into a browser,
etc) and many more critical pieces of information. But what we’re concerned with right now
is how many people are going to your site on a weekly or monthly basis. Once you know
this number, you move on to the next task: calculating your Conversion Rate.
Your Conversion Rate (also called a Conversion Ratio)
Your conversion rate is nothing more than the number of buyers divided by the number of
people who visit your site. So if you look at your web-site statistics and see that out of every
100 people who come to your site only 2 buy, you have a 2% conversion ratio. That might
sound bad, but it’s actually a good conversion rate for the Internet.
To run through another example, let’s say you have:
100 new visitors visit your site
3 of them buy something
Your conversion rate is 3% (i.e., 3 divided by 100)
More on conversion ratios in just a minute. For now, let’s tackle the next input in the
equation used to calculate how much money you can make: Your Purchase Price.
Your Product’s Price
This one’s a no-brainer. How much are you charging for your product? Answer that
question and you have the last input. Now it’s time to calculate how much you can make
per month. Let’s go through an example:
1,000 people visit your site every month
You have a 3% conversion rate
Your product is priced at $27
Using the following formula, you can come up with how much you can make on a monthly
basis:
My Monthly Traffic x My Conversion Rate x Price of My Product
1,000 x .03 x $27 = $810
Value Per Visitor
Next your figure out your average purchase by buyer and by Visitor. Let’s pretend that you
only sell a $27 ebook on your site. This means that out of those 1,000 visitors, you made
$810 from the sales to the 30 people who bought something.
Take the $810 and divide it by the # of visitors you had (1,000) and you get $0.81
Why is this critical?
Because now you know that every time you drive a person to your site you make $0.81 on
them. Now you know that the maximum you’re going to pay for traffic is $0.81 per visitor.
This is HUGE!
You know the exact breakeven for driving someone to your site. You know that if you’re
only paying $0.10 per person through some co-registration service, you should in theory
make $0.71 per visitor.
How Much Traffic Do You Need?
Using the same basic inputs as above, you can now calculate how much traffic you need to
drive to your site on a monthly basis to meet your income goals. So let’s say your goal is to
make $1,000 a month from this one product. Here’s the math behind finding out how
many visitors you need:
My Monthly Profit
(Price x Conversion Rate)
= Traffic to My Site
So your answer would be:
$1,000 / ($27 x .03) = 1,235 visitors per month
So now you know that in order to make $1,000 a month off of your product, you should
drive at minimum 1,235 new prospects to your site every month.
An Added Benefit of Knowing Your Stats
Once you know your stats, you can go to a joint venture partner and tell them that your site
or sales letter converts 3% of the traffic to your site. Work to improve your conversion ratio.
This is critical because the better your site converts, the more interested the big players in
your niche are going to be in doing business with you.
Why?
Because your site converts. They run the math in their head and based on the size of their
list, the percentage they think will go over to your site, and the money per sale you’re giving
him or her and they know how much a potential deal is worth.
Ahh…the power of numbers. Know your conversion ratio and the value of a visitor to your
site and actively work to increase both of those numbers and you’ll soon have people
coming to you with JV offers.
We’ll talk more about conversion ratios and value per visitor in Step #9. For now let’s talk
about creating your bonus pile on. Yes, it’s as fun as it sounds!
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Why should I buy from you? Aside from the great benefits I’m going to get and the results
I’m going to achieve by putting your system into place in my life, why should I buy from
you?
Free stuff, that’s why. I’m sure you’ve seen people advertise anywhere from 3 to 5 (or more)
bonus e-books, reports, newsletters, etc., if you buy their products. Well, now you need to
create a list of bonuses that you will offer to your customers as well. To create a list,
approach it with this question in mind:
“If I buy this product, what other resources am I going to need?”
Yanik Silver did a great job in coming up with his bonuses for Instant Sales Letters. This
is what he offers you at the time of the writing of my e-book:
* A copy of a special e-book "Surefire Sales Letter Secrets: How To Create a
Fortune in Your Business With Powerful Direct Mail." This is a $39.95 value.
* My Surefire Direct Mail Profit Worksheet. This is a $39.95 value.
* Fill-in-the-blank Email Templates.
* Ultimate Sales Letter Tool Box: All The Openings, Bullets, Copy-Connectors,
Selling Words, Phrases, Guarantees, Closes, and P.S.s You’ll Ever Need To
Create Killer Sales Letters (A $39.95 value).
All these items are things that you read and think, “If I bought this I would have everything
I needed to write great sales letters. Where do I buy this e-book now?”
In short, come up with a list of bonuses that make sense and that are closely tied into the
product you’re selling. It makes no sense to giveaway the Think and Grow Rich e-book (like
5,000 other people) when your product is on how to sell more car parts.
Make sense?
Good. Now get going on creating your list of potential bonuses to giveaway. Don’t focus on
whether or not the product exists or if you can get your hands on it just yet. Just focus on
the ideal materials someone would want or need to have in order to instantly solve their
problems.
Bonuses I could give away:
___________________________________
___________________________________
___________________________________
___________________________________
___________________________________
___________________________________
___________________________________
Creating and Getting Your Bonuses
Okay, so you have a list of potential bonuses. Now what? You have to go out and find them
or create them. Remember this list from step #3d?
Well guess what? These 7 main ways to create a product are the same ways that you can
create your bonuses to give away to your customers for purchasing your product(s).
Creating Your Bonuses
The hardest thing to do is #1, which would be to create a product from scratch, but it
doesn’t have to be difficult. If you’ve saved you “scraps” or stuff you didn’t use in creating
your e-book or product, you can quickly package this material into a special report or an ebook that you can give away free.
You can also take an article that you’ve written on a particular topic and add some more
stuff/fluff to the paragraphs, add more steps and lists of resources and suddenly your 2 page
article is a 15 page special report.
Just make sure that any special report you create is really valuable and not just CRAP that
you dug up, slapped together and are passing off as a report valued at $37 or more.
Remember to over deliver and provide value every time you interact with a customer or put
your name on an article, post in a forum or a product. Take the shortcut and the easy way
out of things and you’re going to damage your reputation in the long-term and hurt your
long-term earning power.
Create a Product with Another Writer or Partner
I’ve rarely seen this done, but why not, right? Reach out to a peer in the industry and
suggest you collaborate on a short little viral e-book the two of you can give away free on
your web-sites. How about holding a teleseminar and transcribing the call and using the
transcript as a bonus for your e-book? The possibilities are endless. Just remember to
think win/win and you’ll do just fine.
#3 - #7: All the Rest
I think you get the point. Look through the list of different ways to create or acquire
products for your bonuses and go after them. Keep your product and your customer in
mind and go after products that make sense. By “make sense” I mean products that will
support them and help them in the specific area of your product. For instance, if you’re
selling a copywriting e-book, it doesn’t make sense to giveaway a report on creating a
budget. It’s got to make sense is what I’m trying to get at.
Ask Your Favorite Guru for Help
If you come across a great resource or perhaps you used a special report to write your ebook or create your infoproduct, why not ask the author if you could give away the entire
report or an excerpt to your customers. If the author isn’t currently charging for the
material, they’re probably going to say yes. Why? Because it’s more exposure for them and
more importantly, it might drive traffic to their site from your customers who read the
report, like what they see and want to know more.
And if you’ve already interviewed a number of gurus to help create your product, you can
always go back to them and ask if they’d be willing to allow you to give away some a report
or e-book of theirs away to your customers.
Okay, I won’t beat this one to death because you should find it relatively easy to find 3 to 5
bonuses to offer your customers as an ethical bribe to get them to buy your product.
Speaking of which, let’s talk about creating your offer…
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Once you know what your bonuses are and you’ve got your product in hand, it’s time to take
off the writer’s cap and put on your salesperson’s hat.
You need to create an irresistible offer for people that will draw people into what you’ve got
to say and hopefully get them to buy your products.
Don’t Be Scared of Competition
Why is it that everyone is so afraid to dip their toes into a niche waters with a lot of players?
Sure there might be some sharks in there, but I think playing in a niche with a lot of
competition just means that there are a lot of BUYERS that are starving for information. It
gets back to the whole supply vs. demand thing (you do remember the whole guns vs. butter
model from economics 101, right?).
There are always HUNDREDS of subtopics that you can create in EVERY niche, no matter
how small you think it is. Something as huge as RECIPES can be segmented by different
regions of the country, by diets people are on (low-carb vs. high carb) and so on.
Standing Out from the Crowd (Part Deux)
So if you buy the above argument that having a lot of competition is actually a good thing,
how do you stand out from that HUGE crowd in order to make some real money selling
your products?
You first have to create a brand identity for yourself, but you have to do it practically
overnight. Matt Bacak and I cover the 10 steps you need to take to go from nobody to an
instant expert in Become an Expert in 30 Days..or less!, but what if you’re really,
really, really lazy?
What can you do then?
Easy, just tell everyone a little more about yourself.
I just keep it simple and get back to what one of my mentors told me the secret to selling
information products was. He said that there are 9 words and 3 steps to selling information
products:
1. Tell Your Story
2. Share Your Results
3. Sell Your System
Tell Your Story
So do you have the first part done? What’s your story? What’s your compelling story that
If you visit Yanik Silver’s Instant Internet Profits site, he tells you right up front that he
was a novice and you too can succeed. His sales letter starts out with:
Sometimes the truth really is stranger than fiction…
An Open Letter From a Self-Proclaimed "Computer
Dunce" From Maryland Who "Stumbled Into" The
Perfect Internet Business That Made Him Rich, One That
You Can Start Too With a Few Spare Hours a Week and
For as Little as $125…Even if You Can't Stand
Computers
Immediately you identify with this guy. You’ve got the same problem (not enough time and
you’re not a computer genius, but you want his results. How the heck did he do it?
Share Your Results
Well, now you’re hooked by his story and want to learn how he achieved his results that he
shares with you a little later in his sales letter. Yanik goes on to show you the results he’s
achieved since he created his program.
Sell Your System
Then he sells his system for the remaining portion of his sales letter.
All the Gurus Follow This Blueprint
The following is not meant to be construed as direct quotes from these well-known gurus.
I’m just making the point that the best infopreneurs follow this simple 3-step formula to
make millions. Here are a few examples of some famous stories, paraphrasing of course:
Tony Robbins – I was 38 pounds overweight until I discovered my breakthrough system
that transformed me in an instant and I went from a 400 sq. foot bachelor pad to living in a
castle and flying my helicopter. I even bought an island.
Robert Kiyosaki – I was dead broke and living in a beat up old Toyota, but using the
teachings of my Rich DadTM I was able to retire at the age of 47! That’s 18 years early. How
did I do it? Well if you buy my tapes, books and attend my seminars, I’ll show you exactly
how I did it.
Carlton Sheets – Hello, my name is Carlton Sheets and many years ago, I was just like
you. I was working at my company when I was laid off from my job. I then discovered the
power of buying real estate with none of my own money and I’m financially free. When you
buy my No Money DownTM system, you will achieve success beyond your wildest dreams.
Richard Simmons – All my life I was fat. I was so fat it made me depressed. I discovered
a simple way to lose weight and look at me now! Just look at my before and after pictures
and you’ll see what a difference my Deal-A-MealTM System (or my Sweating to the OldiesTM)
has made in my life. Buy the program today and you’ll…
Those are just my favorites, but take a look at ANY successful infopreneur and you’ll see
that they use the same 3-step formula to achieve AMAZING results!
I do something similar with my Write It Fast! e-book. If you visit my site at
www.WriteItFast.com, I’ll share with you how I struggled for 3 years to complete my
first book. But I had an idea for a second book and I didn’t want to waste another 3 long
years of my life trying to write that second book, so I went out and learned as much as
possible about the writing process and what master writers were doing to write their books
in days, not years.
Then I tell you how I wrote, edited and shipped that book off to the printers in less than 30
days. I even reinforce my success by telling you that my third manuscript was written in 30
days. So it’s not a fluke, but a proven system.
Does this make sense? Does this show you how by sharing who you are and where you’re
coming from, you can quickly and easily get people to identify with you and feel like they
“know” you? They can relate to you and they relate to you on their level. They see you as
not some guru, but a friend who went through the same thing they’re going through.
But there’s a difference between you and where they are right now in life, you found a
“secret” or a proven method of changing your situation. Now they want to know what it is.
Add a few teaser statements of the steps you took and add some PROOF to your web-site
and sales letter (before and after photos, photos of checks you’ve earned or vacations you’ve
taken) and you’ll soon find that your new “friend” has their credit card out.
Why?
Because you told your story, they identified with it, you shared a little about your system
and proved to them that it works and can work AUTOMATICALLY and practically
OVERNIGHT!!!
That’s how you stand out from the crowd: telling your story, providing
proof that it works and delivering an outstanding system/software/ebook/manual that delivers on the promises you’ve made.
Just remember the secret formula:
1. Tell Your Story
2. Share Your Results
3. Sell Your System
What’s My Story?
What Are My Results?
Sell My System
(In as few words as possible, describe your product and why someone should want to
purchase it)
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Getting Testimonials
What have you done and who have you helped. Answer those two questions and you’ll
come up with a short list of people to reach out to in order to get testimonials for your website and your email correspondence to potential customers. Then you just reach out to them
and let them know that it’s a win/win situation if they have a web-site because you’ll include
a link to their site, thus bringing in traffic and boosting their ‘score’ with search engines.
With your regular clients, it’s well their way of giving back and you don’t have to sell them
too much on the idea of sending you 2 to 4 sentences on why they love you.
Reaching Out to Clients and Other Success Stories
Hopefully the people who have used your product and/or service have been happy and they
would be delighted to write you a quick testimonial that you can use.
Just remember to ask if you can use their real name and state where they live. Having a
“Anna Tussot from Bedford, NY” versus just a “Anna T. from NY” saying you’re amazing
adds to the credibility piece. Readers won’t think you wrote the testimonial yourself with
the first one, but with the second one, that’s got PHONY written all over it.
Now it’s one thing to get a testimonial from an everyday person and yes, testimonials from
regular people have their place, but it’s an entirely different thing to get THE expert in your
niche or some other niche to sing your praises. Those testimonials are worth their weight in
gold! So how do you get them? Weren’t you paying attention a few short steps ago? Just
kidding.
During step #3e: Polish Your Product, I wrote:
A Jury of Your Peers
I highly recommend that you send out your e-book to a number of your peers within
your industry for their review. You do this to secure a quick blurb or testimonial for
your e-book that you can use on your web-site and in promotions for the e-book.
Tell your peers to give you an honest review of what they see and tell them to make
suggestions to make the e-book better. Tell them to be brutally honest if necessary
and make recommendations for what to cut out or what to tighten.
If you’ve been following the steps in order and you’ve done step #3e, you’ve got 4 to 6
industry experts that you can go to for a testimonial of your product.
What’s In It For Them?
When you send a request to your peers and other gurus to give you a testimonial for your
product, you’ll get 99 out of 100 giving you a very favorable testimonial for your e-book.
Why? It’s the whole “What’s In It For Me” mentality. Your guru that you’ve reached out to
is now going to get exposure to everyone who visits your web-site AND if you give them first
crack at promoting your e-book through your affiliate program, they’ll make a LOT of
money from promoting YOU. So don’t be afraid to ask for a testimonial for your product.
You’re going to get many more “Yes’s” than “No’s” when you ASK for help.
The best testimonials are specific in that they talk about specific results that a person
achieved from using your product or service.
Parasite Marketing
Linking up with a great joint venture partner is one of the smartest things you can do if
you’re starting out in this business. You get to hook up with a partner who has a big list and
a big name, that has a loyal following. Make that a loyal following of paying customers. So
what are you doing with this relationship? Well according to Dan Kennedy, you’re using
“Parasite Marketing” at it’s best. The analogy he draws is to a parasite that goes out and
finds a living organism to attach itself to and live off of. That’s exactly what you need to do.
Never fancied yourself as a parasite, did you?
Playing the Association Game
Well the analogy is a great one to draw because you literally are in search of gurus and
experts that are going to “feed you” not only their list of subscribers, but breaking industry
news, contacts, resources and much, much more. Of course in the process of them
promoting your teleseminar or product that you’ve created together, they’re endorsing you
with each and every contact with their subscribers. Now you’re associated with the guru.
You’ve been pulled up to the same level as the guru without having to spend all the years of
learning what the guru knows and building a business around that area of expertise. You
did it simply through association. It just boggles my mind how easy it is to become an
expert in life. Simply amazing!
A Real Life Case Study
By the way, this just isn’t theory it works in the real world. What I’ve described so far is the
exact method and model I used when trying to break into the book coaching and e-book
coaching business. Who was I when I started? I was just like every other self-published
author who wanted to make more money from their books and their experience. But I had a
plan. I interviewed Dan Poynter, Jay Conrad Levinson, Roger Parker and Rick Frishman
and through the very detailed and planned out promotional campaign I created, I associated
myself with them and became an expert in writing and publishing books…virtually
overnight! Today I coach people how to write, publish and promote their books
(see: Write It FAST!) and I couldn’t have done it without playing the Association Game!
So you now know that having a great JV partner will mean the difference between being
successful and having outrageous success, but what exactly is a joint venture partner?
Joint Venture Partners
Talk to anybody online these days and they’re likely to give you two explanations or
definitions of what a JV partner is. Some will say that if someone participates in your
product, through an interview or providing you with their content, they’re technically a JV
partner. Others go by a stricter definition: a JV partner is someone who co-creates and is
billed as your co-author/creator. I personally go with the latter definition. I actually make
it more stringent by saying “if the person doesn’t send out a mailing to their list about your
product, then they’re not a JV partner.”
Having the right joint venture partners on board can make or break your product. And if
you have a lot of them, you’re virtually guaranteed best-seller success. By a lot, I mean that
you line up 10 to 20 people with average to above-average lists to help push your product.
By a few I mean having 2 to 3 high-powered JV partners to really push your product. In
fact, if you get the right JV partner on board, you could be looking at a mailing to 100,000+
people during your launch. That’s HUGE!
Find the kings and queens of their niches and see if they’ll do a call or be on one of your
calls with you. You can work it either way. You can play host to them and ask all the
questions or you can put together a panel of pros to talk about a particular subject. Grab
Alex Mandossian to talk about conversion, Joel Christopher to talk about list building,
Armand Morin about developing killer products for under $500, Perry Marshall to talk
about making a killing using Google Adwords, Yanik Silver about sales letters, Rosalind
Gardner about affiliate marketing, Joe Vitale about copywriting, Marc Harty about
search engine optimization, Dan Poynter about writing books, and well me to talk about
personal finance and writing books (and any other subject you want me to talk about). ☺
How’s that for providing you with a laundry list of names that you can go after for getting to
do a teleseminar with? Click on the links, go to their sites and check out their products. If
you like what you see, buy them, read them and then contact the individuals to do a
teleseminar with you or at minimum, ask them to put you in touch with other gurus and
experts within their niche. It never hurts to ask!
Makings of a Great Partner
There are many characteristics and things you should be looking at when you’re searching
for a JV partner. First off you want them to have a big enough name that they can sell a few
seats for your teleseminar. Most big names can do this for you, but some experts out there
have HUGE LISTS of people who have no problem whipping out their credit cards to hear
their favorite guru speak.
In addition to wanting a well-known expert in their niche with a big list, you want someone
who is easy to work with and will do at least some of the work in creating the event. On the
flip side, if you are able to snag a big enough name, it might be worth doing most of the
work just for the chance of being associated with and create a product with them.
Yes, you read that right. I’m suggesting that if you’re just starting out, it could make sense
to sell your services dirt cheap if the person is big enough and can guarantee you a big
audience for not only your call, but for purchasing the product as well. No wonder…
Finding a great JV partner or even a good one is
hands-down the FASTEST way to get rich online.
They give you the exposure, the credibility and the access to their best paying customers
when they endorse your product.
How Do You Find Them?
Don’t overcomplicate the process. You can find them by looking through the best-seller list
at Clickbank, on discussion forums, reading articles, attending seminars, word-of-mouth
and just plain snooping around and asking who the big players in your niche are. If you
can’t figure out who the big players are in your niche within a week, then just go to a
discussion forum and post a question like:
“Who are the big players in [insert name of your niche or hobby]?”
Don’t laugh, people actually do this and I’ve seen a number of posts like the above. They
work.
So how do you get them on board? You’ve got to create a short list of the gurus you’d like to
work with, and then approach them with an offer. But before you go making offers, you
might want to check them out first.
Check Out Your Guru Before You Pitch Them
One great piece of advise I learned from Alex Mandossian, a real pro teleseminar host, is
that you should always check your expert out beforehand. You need to know if they’re going
to be articulate and insightful (not to mention helpful) on your call BEFORE you get them
on the call and waste your time and money promoting an event that might bomb. A lot of
experts out there might be good at writing an e-book, book or even doing a tape set, but they
can’t speak worth a darn. You must find out how well-spoken they are and how good they
are at communicating with others BEFORE you get them on your call.
With that word of warning, let’s move on to finding out how you can create an offer that is
so tempting, they just can’t say NO.
Make Them An Offer They Can’t Refuse
So how do you get them on board? You make it as easy as possible for them to make money
while doing practically NOTHING. Tell them that you’re willing to create the entire product
and all you want them to do is put their name on it, alongside yours and send out a note or
three to their list announcing the teleseminar.
Sweetening the Pot
Sometimes a guru isn’t going to want to do a teleseminar or create a product with you
without getting a piece of the action. It’s up to you how much you want to give them
because the reality is that there are plenty of gurus out there that will do a teleseminar for
free as long as they get a chance to drop the name of their product every other minute and
sell a product package at the end of the call. Hold out and don’t bring up the money issue or
splitting of the profits. Let them do that and hold off on giving them any of the profits if
possible. It sounds selfish, but it’s not. Most experts don’t ask for anything more than the
ability to promote their products on the call.
But sometimes you have to up the ante and the max you can or should go is to split the
profits 50/50. I mean, what guru is going to resist an offer to get 50% of the profits and
have someone else create the majority of the product, write the sales letter, write all the ads,
set up the autoresponder series, as well as create the site AND pay all the expenses? Only
the dumb ones won’t at least listen to what you have to say.
Yes, you read that right. It’s the sacrifice you make when you’re starting your career.
Consider yourself “paying your dues” to get access to the gurus list of
subscribers, as well as be a co-author/creator with the guru.
Just make sure that you figure out all the terms and come to agreement on how the money
and list will be created and marketed to before you get into the actual promotion of the call.
The last thing you want to be doing is to be still hashing through the nitty gritty stuff while
you’re starting to promote your call. You might find that you can’t come to terms with a
particular guru and the call won’t come to fruition. Now what?
Exactly. You’re in deep you know what!
Don’t make this mistake. Agree to terms and don’t give into their demands too easily. Yes,
it’s important to have them on board, but you don’t have to quickly give them 50% of the
profits without putting up a fight.
Super Tip – Even if a guru turns you down on participating in or co-creating a product,
you can still get them to help you in three main ways:
•
•
•
By giving you a testimonial
By giving you leads of other gurus that might be interested in working with you
By letting you interview them for inclusion in the product
How do you get this from them? You ASK for it. If they’ve said NO to working with you,
you’ve got NOTHING to lose by asking for a testimonial or a lead that you can go harass…I
mean ask if they’re interested in working with you.
Super Super Tip – Don’t bank on snagging the top marketer in your niche or even the
second or the third. Yes, it can happen, but it’s unlikely. Go after that smaller player who’s
looking for JV partners who might be a few steps ahead of you (and not light years like that
top guru). Once you establish your track record with this person and make a name for
yourself, you’re going to find that you’ll be able to get the top guns interested in you and
what you have to offer.
Expert(s) on Board
Once you do have a guru on board to work with you, you really have to go out of your way to
make it EASY for them to HELP YOU. And the bigger they are, the more work you should
expect to do and be willing to do…with a SMILE. Yes, I’m repeating myself (it’s for
dramatic effect).
At times it might seem like you’re getting the raw end of the deal because you’re writing the
entire e-book, sales letter, articles and other promotion materials, but they’re giving you two
critical pieces that will guarantee your success:
! Their Name
! Their List
You probably can add in “Their Testimonials” because they’re going to reach out to their
friends and get several other big names in your niche to endorse the product.
Talk to any newbie who got a chance to work with a guru and did “all” the work and you’ll
hear 100% of them say they would do it again in a heartbeat. Why? Because they sold
THOUSANDS of copies of their product, quickly built a list of PAYING CUSTOMERS that
they now own/jointly own with a GURU, established their expertise in their niche and
probably got pulled into the guru’s inner circle where they had a chance to NETWORK with
other infopreneurs with big lists and big names.
I think the tradeoff is worth it, especially when you can quickly churn out your second, third
and fourth products in a matter of less than a year if you’ve got money on the brain (and
caffeine running through your veins).
So I’ve sold the sizzle on why you want to do and get JV partners on board, but the reality is
that it’s not easy to get a co-creator for your product. It’s going to take a lot of hard work
and follow-up on your end. If this is something you’re up for, then this route (i.e., cocreating a product with a guru) is one of the best ways to ride their coattails and establish
yourself in your niche.
The Joint Venture Letter
Remember when I said that “Some will say that if someone participates in your product,
through an interview or providing you with their content, they’re technically a JV partner?”
Well, here’s how I recruited several JV partners for one of my products. I used Instant
Sales Letters to help me get inspired as well as swipe some key phrases for my JV letter
that I wrote to get some big name infopreneurs on board to help participate in and help
promote my product.
The “Will You Let Me Interview You Pretty Please” Letter
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
[Insert Name],
I know you're a busy person, so I'll get right to it.
I'm in the process of putting the finishing touches on an e-book
on how to write a book in 30 days or less. At the end of the e-book,
I plan on including several interviews with successful authors.
I want you to be one of them!
I’ve read your book [insert name of book] dozens of times and
it really helped me write my two books:
The Secrets of Wealth: The Beginner’s Guide to Financial Freedom
The Wealthy Pauper
So it’s obvious to me that you’re an expert and know your stuff
and I want everyone to know how great you are. So if it’s not too much trouble,
I would need just 15 to 20 minutes of your time to do a quick interview
that will be administered via e-mail.
The e-book is titled Write It Fast: How to Write a Book in 30 Days...or less!
and I’ve already lined up [insert names of others participating] to take part,
so I know the e-book is going to sell well.
I would love to have you on board and well, since your name and bio
will be in the e-book, I know the e-book will help drive visitors to your site.
Plus you can make some money from the Clickbank affiliate link
you can use if you ever promote the e-book in a newsletter or on your site.
And of course I’d give you a free copy of the e-book once it’s completed.
To lock in your spot in this e-book, email me right now to let me know
If you’re interested and I’ll send you the questions to answer.
I really hope to see your name among the list of other experts in the e-book.
The e-book is going to go live at the end of [insert a date that’s 3 weeks away]
so let me know if you’re in or not (I hope you’re in)!
I think it would be one of those win/win situations for both of us.
Fabio "fabman" Marciano
http://www.fabmansecrets.com
[email protected]
P.S., Just hit reply now to let me know that you’re in and
I’ll save you a spot in the e-book or let someone else have it.
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
How Did My Letter Do?
I admit, looking back at the letter right now, that it wasn’t the greatest I could have done,
but it worked. I think it worked because I was very upfront and right off the bat I dropped
some names of the other experts that were participating. This adds credibility to the
project.
Later in the letter I appealed to the expert’s ego and told them how great they were and well,
I wasn’t lying to get them on board. I really go after the best of the best and work my way
down when I create products like this. I mean I got Yanik Silver, Joe Vitale, Willie
Crawford to name a few for this product!
Then I talked about the benefits they would receive from participating in the project as well.
Both from a visibility and promotion standpoint, as well as from a money standpoint if they
decided to promote the e-book as well.
Then I cap it off with a postscript that urged them to take immediate action and not lose
their spot to one of their other peers.
Not Every Guru Will Say YES – Have Backups
I’ve used a variation on the letter for several of my JVs and the letter pulls somewhere
between 60% to 70%. For my first JV, I overbooked it, meaning I signed up two or three
more experts than I needed because I knew that sometimes life gets in the way and some
people are unable to participate or run out of time and so on. Of course you can have the
opposite happen. For my e-book on how to write e-books called The One Minute eBook,
I originally wanted 5 experts to participate and I ended up with 8 interviews. I didn’t care
though because the interviewees all touched on different things even though they were
answering similar questions.
Now it’s not all roses and sometimes that “must-have” guru is going to give you a response
like the one below that I got:
“That's the understandment of the month. I just don't have 1/2 hour to give you. Sorry.”
Shrug it off, be polite, thank them for their consideration and move on to more savvier and
smarter people that can help you. There’s always another guru and another expert that
understands the Law of Reciprocity so don’t let any “no thank you’s” get you down. Just go
out and look for the next person that will say YES!
Make a List of Experts You Can Use
This is why it’s important for you to have more than one expert in mind when you’re creating
a teleseminar. The last thing you want to do is bank everything on getting one or two JV
partners on board, because if they don’t come through, you’re going to lose precious time
trying to go and find more warm bodies to fill your teleseminar. Do yourself a favor and
make a list of 7 to 10 people you could interview and have on your teleseminars before you
contact that first partner.
Follow Up
One thing that I definitely struggle with is following up with people. Not every guru is going
to get your first email or even be interested in it. The big names get dozens of requests to do
JVs every single week, if not daily thanks to people like me telling people like you that
they’re the best thing since sliced bread (and they are for the infopreneur). What I’m
getting at is that you need to be persistent in your follow up and recontact people because
the spam filter might have nabbed your e-mail or they just weren’t interested a week ago.
It’s obviously a numbers game. The more people you have on your list and the more people
you follow up with, the better your odds of getting people on board to do JV deals with you.
It’s as simple as that. Don’t complicate the process. Create a killer offer for your potential
partners, then relentlessly shop it around.
Note: By following up, this does NOT mean being belligerent and sending an email every
single day to someone. That’s a recipe for getting tossed in the recycle bin.
Will Gurus Really Help You?
If you’re new to the Internet Marketing World, then you’re thinking there’s no chance in
hell that a guru is going to help little old you, but you’re wrong. They will help you. To find
out why, just ask the question:
What’s in it for them?
Hmmm. Lets find out.
Easy to Do – It’s not too hard to sit at the other end of a phone and answer questions on a
topic that you know intimately. As I’ve mentioned before, your guru doesn’t do much of the
prep work or have to prepare much for the call. They just send out a few e-mails, pick up
the phone and dial a number and “invest” one to two hours of their time and get paid very,
very well for their effort. Not a bad deal. Add on the fact that they don’t have to fly
somewhere to give a seminar and still sell as much product as a 3-day event and you can
quickly see why so many gurus are doing teleseminars these days.
Search Engine Ranking – By creating a sales letter or two that will be on your web-site
that includes the guru’s name and their web-site, you’re helping increase their search engine
positioning because they’re going to have yet another site pointing to their site.
Promotion – By sending out e-zine announcements and getting your friends to help
increase the awareness of your teleseminar, you’re going to give your friendly guru a ton of
visibility. Every little bit helps in this game.
Increased Visibility – If they’re a big name then it’s hard to say if you’re going to
“expose” them to a new audience, but it’s probable. Yet another reason why gurus like it
when someone outside their narrow niche asks them to do an interview/teleseminar.
Product – After the call is done and you’ve transcribed it or burn the audio files to a CD,
you’ve got a product that you can now sell. The guru has yet another product that they’re in
that will showcase them as an expert in their niche. And when you have dozens of affiliates
that you’ve worked hard to get to push your product, they’re indirectly promoting your
guru.
Money – By allowing them to pitch their products at the end of the call, they’re going to get
some of your best customers as coaching clients. In addition, there will be many more than
a few who will buy their e-book or at minimum sign up for their free newsletter. When the
dust settles, they can make anywhere from $1,500 to $10,000 depending on the size of your
call and the products they’re selling.
Much More – There are other reasons like giving back, helping out a newbie, continued
exposure for them and their business and so on. The point is they’re going to help you, but
they can’t help you if you don’t ask. ASK!!!
So that’s why they’ll help you out. Just don’t forget to get a testimonial for them before and
after the call…
Testimonial Heaven
It also doesn’t hurt if one or more of your interviewees give you a blurb or testimonial for
your sales letter. Now you have instant credibility from an expert within your niche. Smart,
very smart.
But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. Let’s get back to interviewing your experts.
Your List of Interview Questions
It shouldn’t be too hard at this point to come up with a list of interview questions. If you’ve
done your homework and ASKED your target market what they wanted most and what their
biggest problems were, you’d already have a short list of questions to ask them. Also, in
researching your experts you likely came across a number of interviews they’ve done and
articles they’ve written. Just select some questions from the interviews, reword them and
get it going. Don’t complicate the process.
S
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6 –– W
r i te Y
our K
illleer
rS
ales LLetter
e tte r
Step
Write
Your
Kil
Sales
Have you ever written any sales copy before? If you’re like me, the only sales copy you ever
wrote was the subtitle on your e-book and if you’ve written a book before (or attempted to),
you can include the “sales copy” on the back of the book. That’s it. And if you expect to sell
a ton of e-books, you’re going to need to know a thing or two about writing copy that pulls.
Don’t sweat it though. While it definitely is a craft unto its own and the best-pulling
copywriters get thousands of dollars to write a single sales letter, you can quickly write a
decent-pulling sales letter in the matter of minutes. I’ll show you how in a few minutes, but
first let’s talk about the sales letter itself before we get into the actual writing of it.
Your Swipe File – Modeling Success
Every guru out there is going to tell you to have a model e-book that you use to base yours
off of or to swipe some sales letters to learn how to write killer sales letters of your own, but
I think there’s another item you have to “swipe” – a Killer Web-Site.
Reinventing the wheel is not something I like to do, so when I had to create my web-site, I
went online and found web-sites I liked and wrote their URLs down. I then went to the
web-sites of the top ten e-book sellers and saw how they did things. I then took notes on all
aspects of their layout and for certain things:
•
•
•
•
How they captured email addresses
Whether it’s a mini-site or a content site
How they build their credibility
And lastly, how they get their sales letters to pull (sell) like crazy
Again, I can’t stress enough the importance of learning from those that have “been there
and done that” and have already achieved the success you are looking to attain.
First things first before you start writing your own sales page. You need to go out and find
some model sales pages that are successful. How do you know which sales pages are pulling
like crazy?
Easy, you go to Clickbank and look at their best-seller list. These are the top-sellers in
their category, which means, we’re assuming here of course, that their sales pages are pretty
darn good. You simply click on each of the links to the titles and scan through the sales
letters. If some grab your attention and you find yourself wanting to buy the product, print
out the sales letter and keep them handy. You’re going to be referring to them quite often.
Here are some sales pages that you might want to print out and keep handy:
Uh, duh! Yanik’s sales letter for his product is phenomenal.
Instant Sales Letters
Another Yanik sales letter that’s incredible.
Instant Internet Profits
One of my sales letters that pulls like crazy!
Teleseminar Magic
The sister site to Teleseminar Magic isn’t too shabby either:
Write It FAST! How to Write a Book in 30 Days…or less!
A great sales letter to check out for products with multiple contributors/interviews:
Success Alert
One from the master in marketing, Jay Abraham:
Abraham Internet Strategies
This I Joe Vitale’s site and he’s just a master copywriter. Click on his products and see what
grabs your attention:
Mr. Fire
Print Them Out and Study Them
While you’re at the above sites, make sure you print out the sales letters. Really study them
in-depth. Find out what makes them so successful, i.e., what made you want to push the
“BUY NOW” button at the end. Pay particular attention to:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
How the headlines and subheadlines draw you in…IMMEDIATELY?
How the testimonials are laid out and positioned throughout the letter.
What words tug at your emotions and cause you to read more?
What type of bonuses they list?
What’s the perceived value of those bonuses?
How do they close you and get you to whip out your credit card.
What do they put in their Postscript (P.S.) to get you to reconsider buying NOW?
How long are the sales letters?
Must-Have Books on Copywriting
And if you want to really “bone up” on your copywriting, check out these books.
Advertising Secrets of the Written Word by Joe Sugarman
Tested Advertising Methods by John Caples
The Robert Collier Letter book by Robert Collier
All three are on my bookshelf and are dog-eared and highlighted to death because the stuff
in them is so powerful. These guys are the best at what they do and you should RUN out
and get them.
Oh, one more resource. Go to www.GaryHalbert.com and sign up for his newsletter. It’s
free and you’re going to be blown away with the simplicity with which he breaks it down for
you and gives it to you straight.
Now that you’ve got a few sales letters in front of you and you’ve gone through a topline of
why they worked for you, let’s go a little more in-depth.
Killer Headlines that SELL
The most important part of your sales letter is your headline. It has to demand attention
and instantly connect with your potential customer. It has to hit at the core of their
problem or reason for visiting your site in the first place.
Therefore make it BIG AND BOLD and stick out so the prospect can’t help but read (and
identify with) the headline.
Sometimes developing that Killer Headline will take longer to create and write than the rest
of the sales letter. It’s that important so don’t gloss over it. Spend the time going through
your research and notes, spend time talking to consumers about their problems and come
up with a Killer Headline. It will make the difference in your sales – guaranteed!
A list for Killer Headline Creation from Yanik Silver’s Instant Sales Letters that I keep
handy helps me write my headlines. Yanik states that your headlines should:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Identify your ideal prospect and speak only to them.
Offer the biggest promise or self-serving benefit to the reader.
Your headline should make the reader inclined to keep reading.
Offer news if possible.
Try to suggest there is an easy and quick way to get the results advertised.
Simply great stuff to remember. Keep these thoughts in the back of your mind while trying
to formulate your Killer Headlines!
Sales Copy – A Focus on One
Like I said earlier, I haven’t written a ton of copy in my life, but I know how to talk to people
about the subjects that matter to me. And that’s what you have to do in order to sell: talk
about your topic with passion to one person at a time.
You should load up your copy with the benefits your prospect will receive from purchasing
your product. You must sell them on all the benefits and results they will get just from
reading your e-book. Position your e-book as the solution to their most common problems.
Show them how it will eliminate their fear of something or how it will help them do
something better.
The key is tie back into your research of the most common problems and concerns your
target audience has and what they’re looking for.
Write your copy like you’re talking one-on-one to someone about the subject matter of your
e-book. When you do this, your passion, your enthusiasm and the benefits of what your ebook will come pouring out.
Remember to focus on writing to one person and you’ll be amazed at the results.
Testimonials
Let’s face it; you’re a nobody. I don’t mean to put you down, but that’s probably the reality
right now. I don’t care if you have 50 people on your list or 5,000 people; you’re a nobody.
You don’t have a “brand name” and you don’t have thousands of affiliates selling your
product for you. Therefore you need to establish instant credibility and trust with your
prospective customer. One way of doing this is through the use of a testimonial from a
satisfied customer or through praise from a peer of yours.
You can get them by sending an email out to your list of subscribers asking them to fill out
your survey on something and the reward for filling it out is an advance copy of your ebook. Then when you send it to them, you ask them to take the time to review it as soon as
possible to give you feedback. A testimonial would be most welcomed you tell them and of
course you’ll include a link back to their web-site, which is always a motivator for other
people to give you a testimonial.
As part of Step #6 (Polish It) in the process of creating your e-book (if you’re following the
simple to use steps in The One Minute eBook), you should have sent out your e-book to
5 or 6 industry peers for their review and feedback. If they haven’t done so already, ask
them for a testimonial for your site.
Remind them that it will help their search engine rankings to have their site listed on yet
another web-site and provide additional exposure for them.
Out of the handful of testimonials that you receive, break them down into two categories:
•
•
Testimonials from big name marketers
Testimonials loaded with benefits that people received from reading your e-book,
using your product or your service
Now you have two categories of great testimonials to sprinkle strategically all over your
sales letter. I like to start my sales letter with a note from the “biggest name” endorser that
I received. This adds instant credibility to your sales letter, your site and your product.
This is why you must aggressively pursue the big names in your niche.
I prefer having long testimonials to those short and cheesy ones that aren’t specific. You
want specific results mentioned in your testimonials that people achieved or received as a
result of using your products. Your readers want to know the specifics behind the solutions
you provide.
One more thing, make sure you use the full name of the person who is giving you the
testimonial, provided that they’re okay with it. Having a testimonial end with “J. Smith”
doesn’t have the same impact of “Johan Smith, Knoxville, Tennessee.” The second one is
more “real” to the reader and seems less made up.
Then I like to pull out my swipe file and review the placement of testimonials in other great
sales letters. I don’t bother with re-inventing the wheel, I just copy the placement of the
testimonials until I run out of testimonials to insert. I put them in distinctive boxes and add
a yellow highlight on occasion to make sure they really stick out. This helps to call attention
to them and sets them apart from your sales copy.
Now you’re done. You have added testimonials in a distinctive manner to your sales letter
and you’ve enhanced the credibility of your product and raised yourself in the eye of your
potential customer.
For more ways to increase your visibility and your credibility among your target niche,
check out the e-book Matt Bacak and I wrote together called Become an Expert in 30
Days…or less. It’s rapidly becoming the industry bible on how to go from nobody to a
wealthy celebrity…almost overnight.
Subheadings
Sprinkled throughout your sales letter should be subheadings. Ideally your subheadings
will be the exact phrases of the most common problems and fears your target audience told
you during your research. The subheadings are like anchors that pull the reader in and
keep them intrigued and focused on reading further.
Make sure they stand out by making them bold or perhaps by changing the font color to
help draw the attention of the reader. Copy that gets noticed gets read. That’s your goal.
You don’t want to make it too distracting, but different enough so that they can’t help but
read what’s below the subheading.
Your Product Description
Just a quick note before I forget to tell you. To come up with your Killer Title you did a
search using the free keyword search tool at www.GoodKeywords.com. I hope you saved
that list because you should ALWAYS try and use the most-searched terms for your product
in your title and your product description. Product what?
Your product description is a brief 2-3 sentence description of what your e-book is all about
and why people should buy it. This is the description that you will send to your affiliates to
put on their web-sites and the one you will use to describe your e-book onClickbank,
www.BookLocker.com and all the other online sellers of e-books.
Why go through all this trouble? Because when people use search engines to come up with
information on your niche topic, they’ll come across your e-book a lot more often. Pretty
sneaky, right? You bet. So what are you waiting for? Pull out that list of keywords you
generated earlier and come up with a brief description of your e-book.
Freebies and Free Bonuses
We already talked about the importance of bonuses in crafting an irresistible offer. Here’s
where you tell your potential customer exactly what bonuses are available when they
purchase your product and how much those bonuses are worth and will help them.
Guarantee
When you offer a 100%, no questions asked, money-back guarantee, you put your potential
customer at ease. They know that they’re in a win-win situation. If they like the product
and use it, they’ll benefit. If they don’t like it, they can get their money back, no questions
asked.
Don’t worry, the percentage of people demanding their money back is in the very low singledigits for most products. Unless you have an awful e-book or product you’re trying to sell,
you should have very few buyers take you up on your return policy.
Also, it’s important to note that having a guarantee adds to your credibility because you’re
standing behind your product. Especially when you’re selling stuff through the Internet,
people are a bit skeptical and leery of what they’ll be getting for their hard-earned money.
Put them at ease by offering a guarantee on your products.
Limited Time Offer
One tactic I see a lot of people using is a limited time offer or limited quantity offer. This
means that after a certain date (usually a couple of days/weeks after launch) or quantity
sold, the price of the product will go up. The reason marketers do this is to create a sense
of URGENCY behind the offer. They’ll often have an HTML script that changes the dates
on the sales letter and the “good until date” automatically. This way when the potential
customer reads it, the good until date is two or three days away. They think they absolutely
must buy now or lose the deal.
Wrong.
I’m guessing that 99 percent of the marketers who use this tactic keep their sales letters and
scripts the same, regardless of whether they’ve met their “quota” or not. They do it just to
create a sense of urgency. I think it’s an unethical practice, but it’s rampant. You choose
whether you do it or not. My hope is that you actually do raise the price or change the offer
once you reach your quota.
PostScript
P.S., Act Now and SAVE over 40% before the price goes up! I don’t care if it’s 2 a.m., if you
order right now, we GUARANTEE you’ll be included in our exclusive mentoring program.
But you must buy NOW!!!
Postscripts like the one above are very, very compelling pieces of copy. I’ve never met
anyone who didn’t read a PS when it’s included in an e-mail or a sales letter. Why is it so
important? Because a lot of people just scan through sales letters without actually reading
them thoroughly. They’ll read that Killer Headline and all the subheadings. Then they’ll
carefully read through the bonuses they’ll get and go searching for the cost of this “proven
and invaluable” resource, then they’ll scroll all the way to the bottom…and see your
postscript.
They read the postscript because it stands out and is in bold and is the last piece of copy on
the sales letter. If it’s benefit-laden and directs them to “click now to start saving
thousands” or “click now to have your own profitable web-site up and running 24 hrs from
now” they just might click on that link.
Keep them short and to the point. Throw in your most important benefits of your product
and you’ll increase the pulling power of your sales letter, all thanks to two little letters: P &
S.
Disclaimer, Terms of Service, Contact Us, Etc.
These are the pages linked to the bottom of your sales letter. I honestly just went to a website and copied most of the language that was in these bottom links. Okay, so I didn’t copy
word for word, but close enough. To me it’s the legal mumbo-jumbo that you need to have
on your site so that you’re not sued. My recommendation, and I’m not a lawyer so see your
own private counselor, is to look at what three or four of the top guns in your niche are
writing and using and do the same. Rewrite it so as not to plagiarize, but get the legal and
necessary stuff in there.
Obviously you can put whatever you want in the “contact us” page.
Call to Action – Do it Often!
Sprinkled throughout your sales letter should be what are called calls to action or calls for
action. This means that you’re asking for the order. Most salespeople make the mistake of
never asking for the order and this is why most salespeople are barely making a living from
hocking their goods. You want to be different and therefore you need to ask for the
order…frequently. Check out your swipe file and you’ll see that some of the biggest names
in the business are asking for the order multiple times throughout the sales letter.
Sometimes the call to action is obvious and sometimes it’s a little disguised, but it’s there.
The overt or obvious ways are by having a “Click to Download” button or a “Buy it Now”
button that sticks out. Other less obvious ways are to insert a “Click here to download”
link that takes them to your order page. Then you can put these links throughout your sales
page and in the postscript. Wherever you put them and however you word them, just put in
a bunch of calls to action. Your site’s main focus is to sell your product and don’t forget it!
Okay, I throw in the towel. That’s enough for me. You need to start writing your sales
letter.
Writing Your Sales Letter
Not to put pressure on you, but your sales letter is the most important part of your selling
toolkit. If you don’t have a great sales letter, you’re not going to have great sales. It’s as
simple as that.
Put your sample sales letters in a stack near your computer and keep your copy of Instant
Sales Letters handy as well. Okay, enough talking. Pull out your printout of Hypnotic
Sales Letter Templates that was included as one of the free bonuses that I gave away when
you bought this e-book. If you’ve misplaced it, just send me an email to
[email protected] with the words “Hypnotic Sales Templates” in the
subject line and I’ll get it to you.
Now using the templates, get writing. Create your sample headlines and list out your
product benefits. List the testimonials that you have or insert the name of the guru you’re
going to ask for a testimonial from. If you get stumped, just turn to one of those sales
letters that sell from your swipe file that are close at hand.
S
tep ##7
7 –– D
evelop Y
our W
eb-Site
Step
Develop
Your
Web-Site
Before I do anything with the design of my web-sites, I sit down with a blank piece of paper,
pull out the two articles by Jay Conrad Levinson that I have included courtesy of Jay and I
start creating the “next steps list” for each of the 8 golden rules and answering the questions
in the second article.
Eight Golden Rules For Your Website
Courtesy of Jay Conrad Levinson, Guerilla Marketing
1. Planning.
You must know ahead of time exactly what you wish to accomplish with your website.
2. Content.
This is what's going to attract visitors to your site, then keep them coming back for more
visits on a regular basis.
3. Design.
There's a "hang or click" moment when people first see your site. Should they hang around
or click away? Design influences their decision.
4. Involvement.
Guerrillas take advantage of the net's interactivity by involving visitors rather than just
requiring that they read.
5. Production.
This refers to putting your first four elements online. Easy-to-use software now can do this
job for you.
6. Follow-up.
People visit your site, email you, ask or answer some questions. Guerrillas respond to their
email, stay in touch.
7. Promotion.
You must promote your site online by registering with search engines and linking with other
sites, while promoting it offline in mass media, mailings, wherever your name appears.
8. Maintenance.
Unlike other marketing, a website requires constant changing, updating, freshening,
renewing. Like a baby.
Copyright 2003, Guerrilla Marketing Association
====================================================
Jay Conrad Levinson
The Father of Guerrilla Marketing and Founder of The Guerrilla Marketing Association
www.guerrillamarketingassociation.com
Author, "Guerrilla Marketing" series of books over 14 million sold; now in 39 languages.
====================================================
Guerrilla Content for Your Web-Site
Courtesy of Jay Conrad Levinson, Guerilla Marketing
Guerrillas know well that their sites will succeed or fail based on how much overlap there is
between their content and the needs of their target audiences. They realize that exquisite
design and spectacular promotion are meaningless if their content doesn't fill the needs of
their market. It's not that difficult to develop that kind of content answer these questions, for
your specific answers will provide your content:
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
!
What is the immediate, short-term goal of your website?
What specific action do you want visitors to take?
What are your specific objectives for the long term?
Who do you want to visit your site?
What solutions or benefits can you offer to these visitors?
What data should your site provide to achieve your primary goal?
What information can you provide to encourage them to act right now?
What questions do you get asked the most on the telephone?
What questions and comments do you hear most at trade shows?
What data should your site provide to achieve your secondary goal?
Where does your target audience look for information?
How often do you want visitors to return to your website?
What may be the reasons you don't sell as much as you'd like to?
Who is your most astute competition?
Does your competition have a website?
What are ways you can distinguish yourself from your competitors?
How important is price to your target audience?
Your answers point the way to what competitive advantages to stress, what to show, what
to say, what to feature. Serve up your content in bite-sized pieces, all valuable -- for it's
clear current content that leads to success on the web. If it's a winner for your guests, it will
be a winner for you.
Copyright 2003, Guerrilla Marketing Association
====================================================
Jay Conrad Levinson
The Father of Guerrilla Marketing and Founder of The Guerrilla Marketing Association
www.guerrillamarketingassociation.com
Author, "Guerrilla Marketing" series of books over 14 million sold; now in 39 languages.
====================================================
Seriously, that’s all I do to map out what I want to do and how I want my webmaster to
design my site(s). Then I make sure that I’ve got a killer mini-site once my product is
ready to go live. Whoops, before we get ahead of ourselves, you should know that you have
two basic choices when creating a web-site:
•
•
Create a Content Web-Site
Create a Mini Web-Site
Each of the above types serves their individual purpose, but which you choose for
promoting your product will determine whether you’re successful or an “also ran.”
Content vs. Mini Sites
Before we move into designing your web-site, we need to make a clear distinction. The websites you’re used to are probably content sites and not mini-sites. Content sites, I mean
sites that have a home page, article pages, contact us pages, newsletter pages and so on. In
short, they’re designed to be content-rich in order to get you to surf the site and sign up for
their newsletter and so on. Mini-sites on the other hand only have one to three pages and
only have one goal in mind: to sell you something. That one page you “land on” when you
type in the URL shows you a sales page and that’s it.
Mini-sites are great for selling information products because they load quickly and are
focused solely on the one product you’re trying to sell. When you have mini-sites with
minimal graphics, the pages can load quickly and you don’t confuse your visitor. According
to recent surveys by The Boston Consulting Group, the company determined that the two
main reasons why customers don’t buy anything or they’re disappointed with their
shopping experience is due to slow loading pages and web-sites that are too confusing.
Mini-sites eliminate this issue altogether because the limited number of pages makes it
easier to load the page quickly on the customer’s browser. Secondly, since mini-sites are
very minimalistic in nature, the customer is presented with a shocking or eye-catching
headline and then there are compelled to read the rest of the sales letter. If they truly are
targeted traffic, then the subject matter will interest them and they will want to find out
more.
It’s no wonder why mini-sites are the preferred type of sites for infopreneurs, so from this
point forward we’re only going to be talking about your mini-site and how you can make it
sell a boatload of your e-books and other information products.
You’re going to want a mini-site design for your web-site and not a content site.
Caveat – You NEED Your Own Content Site
Now just because you should go with a mini site to sell your product, doesn’t mean that you
shouldn’t have your own separate content site. Your content web-site will help build your
name online and bring you credibility and trust, especially if you start publishing a weekly
or bi-monthly newsletter (and you should do so immediately if you’re not already). Without
a content site you can’t take advantage of linking strategies and search engine optimization
strategies such as having content rich pages and articles on your site to drive free search
engine traffic to your site. When you have one main site you can create an associate
program to create an army of affiliates that will promote ALL of your products, instead of
just one of them.
Content web-sites are great for providing educational content for your readers. Through
your articles and your free e-courses and your newsletter, you strive to help teach your
readers more about your area of expertise. Generally the information you’re providing is
FREE, but some savvy marketers have begun to charge a nominal fee for access to their
sites. In order to make the jump from FREE to PAID, you’re going to have to provide some
great content and VALUE to the subscriber.
One such great site for people is Corey Rudl’s Secrets to Their Success site which has
tons of case studies of everyday people making big money on the Internet. Corey sends out
two new case studies every month and it’s worth the tiny investment of $17 a month to be a
part of this incredible site.
So Corey made the transition from a FREE site to a paid one. You can still get a ton of
FREE information at his Marketing Tips site, but it’s no where near the level of
information that you get at his Secrets to Their Success site. Notice that he has more
than one content site. It’s a great strategy for creating thousands of pages of content that
help to raise his ranking in the search engines for specific keywords. And he gets to push
different products in each of the content sites, tailored to the type of visitor that comes to
the sites. Smart. Very smart.
Once you have your content site up and running and humming along with a decent sized
subscriber list, you can begin marketing products and services to them. Just don’t go
overboard and begin sending out product announcements and endorsements in every single
newsletter. People will get turned off to you pretty quickly and unsubscribe from your list
in a heartbeat. It’s okay to send out a product announcement once every 3 or 4 mailings,
but don’t do it more frequently or you’re going to see your list shrink…FAST!
And having a content site will allow you to create “redirect” pages that will allow you to
create simple pages so you don’t have to promote affiliate programs you belong to with
those long URLs that are obviously affiliate links. For example:
http://www.TheirProductDomain.com/moreinfo/123456/
Wouldn’t it be much easier to use something like:
http://www.MyDomain.com/InstantNicheProducts
Of course it’s much easier to do and you won’t have the issue of being barred from using the
link when using some Pay-Per-Click search engines. I could go on and on, but the bottom
line is that you NEED a content site in addition to your mini site(s) if you want to
make a living online.
Armand Morin has his main site at www.GoGenerator.com that lists all of his products
and talks about who he is and the site has a bunch of resources and so on, but you’ll never
find more than one sales page at his other product sites like: AudioGenerator.com or
Smart Page Generator.
He has a content site and several mini sites. Strive to have the same set-up so that you
NEVER DISTRACT YOUR BROWSER FROM THE MAIN ACTION YOU WANT
THEM TO TAKE WHEN VISITING YOUR MINI SITE: BUYING SOMETHING!!!
Sorry to put that all in CAPITALS, but I had to hammer that point home again. I see too
many beginners making the mistake of making their mini sites too fancy and with lots of
different links that people can click. Keep It Simple Stupid is the motto I follow and it’s
worked well for all the big names in the business.
How Mini-Sites Work
The premise behind a mini-site is to find a starving crowd that might be a small crowd, but
they’re really hungry. You ask them what they want and then you go out and get the
product you want. Either you create it or you have someone else create it for you. Then you
build a one or two page site, write a killer sales letter and then your sole focus for
the rest of your life is to drive traffic to that site.
Again, just so you don’t miss it:
The sole focus of your mini-site is to drive highly targeted (pre-qualified)
traffic to your site and get them to BUY YOUR PRODUCT!
If They Don’t Buy
And if they don’t buy your product, your secondary goal is to get their email address. You
do this through an exit popup box or by including an offer for a free report or e-book in the
main body of your sales letter. It’s not difficult to do and one of my friends Jason Lewis
has done a great job of using this tactic at his site No Website Required. Check out the
site and see how you’re almost compelled to give him your email address because you want
the free report he offers.
The point is that you have a pre-qualified prospect that has clicked on your site and you
don’t want them to leave without capturing their email address. Once you have their email
address, you’ve gained their permission to follow-up with them. Now you can loop them
into your autoresponder series and provide them some valuable content and hopefully sell
them your product down the line.
Sales Page Basics
Forget fancy graphics and bouncing doodads. You need a simple and straightforward sales
page that should not distract the potential customer from the main objective of the page…to
sell them one of your e-books. It’s amazing how many people fall into the trap of adding
eye-distracting graphics, colors and templates to their sales page. Don’t fall into the trap.
Remember the K.I.S.S. acronym and Keep It Simple Stupid.
Don’t use Flash or any other fancy program. Plain old HTML works best and it loads
the fastest. You want a fast-loading page, remember that. The faster it loads, the better
because you don’t want a potential customer to get frustrated because they’re waiting while
your page loads. They’ll leave your site and you’ll have lost a potential sale…and a potential
lifetime customer.
You’re looking to optimize your site for that one product. By including frequent mentions of
keywords throughout your sales letter and by focusing on those few precious keywords and
not a thousand of them, you’ll get highly targeted traffic to your site. And as you know by
now, the more targeted the traffic, the better off you’ll be.
Search Engine Optimization
If you’re a newcomer to the Internet and marketing on the Internet in particular, then you
probably haven’t heard of search engine optimization. If you’ve been around a while, you’re
probably either sick of hearing about it or some stat-spouting addict who loves to talk about
page rankings and how quickly your site got to the top of Google.com. Wherever you’re
starting out, there are some basics you need to know about…and some pitfalls you need to
avoid. Let’s start with the basics of your mini-site.
Steps To Optimizing Your HTML Codes
by Shelley Lowery
Your key to success in online marketing and promotion is your web site. From your title, keywords,
meta tags, and text, to your over all site design, each plays a very important role when optimizing
your site. If your site doesn't rank in the top 10 or 20 when doing a keyword search at the top search
engines, your target audience won't be able to find you.
About 80 percent of all web site traffic originates from the eight major search engines. Most people
will go to a search engine, type in a keyword or keyword phrase and look through the top 10 - 20
results. Most of the time they'll find what they're looking for in the first 10 results.
The percentage of click throughs are even smaller. Listing near the top and grabbing the attention of
your target audience is the top priority. There are many components of your web page that you
should pay close attention to when preparing it for listing in a search engine.
The first step towards improving your listing is selecting the best keywords and keyword phrases that
best reflect your web page. Keywords are the foundation of your web presence in the search
engines.
* Keywords
To help you choose effective keywords and keyword phrases, there are two important steps. First of
all, get a Thesaurus and investigate synonyms for your original keywords. Write these words down
on a sheet of paper. Next, perform your keyword and keyword phrases search at the major engines.
Pay close attention to the web sites that rank 1 through 10. View the source code of these pages.
Pay close attention to their placement of keywords in their headers and tags.
* Tags
Tags are HTML code that enable the search engines to determine what keywords are relevant to this
specific site.
The META "description" tag will contain a description of your site. Make sure your description
contains some of your relevant keywords.
The META "keywords" tag will contain a listing of your keywords and keyword phrases that are
relevant to your site and enable a search engine to find you.
Example:
Top Professional Pet Groomers" name=DESCRIPTION
* Text
Not only are the html tags an important part of optimization, but it is almost just as important to add
plenty of text to your pages. Your text should contain each of your keywords used in different
variations. I.E. If your keywords are free, promotion, marketing, advertising, Your text might say
something like this; Promotion, Marketing and Advertising are the key to your success. We offer
many promotional resources, including; Free marketing articles, classified advertising and free
promotion.
Optimization will be your solution to winning the search engine wars.
About the Author
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Shelley Lowery is the Webmistress of Web Source - Your Guide to Professional Website Design and
Development. Join The Syndicator, our new, free article syndication program and display complete
articles w/photographs on your website that are automatically updated each week. http://www.websource.net
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“SEOs are not a shortcut to success, at least not for 99% of the
companies out there. You won't win by fooling Google into listing you
first for a common search term. You will win once you figure out the
simple mechanics of turning strangers into friends and friends into
customers.”
- Seth Godin, Author of Free Prize Inside
Caution: Don’t Pay to Get Ahead
Watch out for those people pitching to get you to the top of Google.com or some other
search engine. Those folks will likely get you banned from some search engines before they
get you to the top of the list. If you’re truly anxious to get to the top of search engines, you
can always pay to do it; pay for ads that is.
Need a Pro?
If you just read the above and you’re scratching your head, then you’re just like me. I can’t
make heads or tails out of most web pages and stuff and I’m just learning the ropes myself.
My webmaster does most of the nittty gritty stuff for me. But I recently came across a
speaker at an event I attended and the two of us became fast friends. His name is Marc
Harty and he’s an expert at search engine optimization. Marc shared with me some quick
tricks of the trade and I’m putting them in place and I’ve already seen some rapid
improvements in my rankings. If you want to learn more about what Marc has to offer,
including his must have e-book called Strategic Traffic, just visit his site by the same
name: Strategic Traffic. Tell him I sent you!
Exit Pop-ups
SuperTip: Upon exiting and not purchasing the product (and why didn’t you buy, might I
ask?) were you offered a freebies? What was it? Was it compelling? Did you sign up?
Some people say pop-ups annoy people. I agree, but not from sites where I wanted to surf
on and was looking for information. If the pop-up is not relevant to what I was looking for
(read: from the site owner), then I get mad. But if it’s from the site owner asking me for my
email for a free excerpt from the e-book I almost bought, then I’m intrigued. Were you?
Make a note to look into putting an exit pop-up on your sales page.
Autoresponders
Once you get your site up and running (and your list is growing), the number of emails and
requests for information will grow exponentially. Especially if you’re handing out your website address at every opportunity possible. In short, you’re going to need a little help
handling all the requests for information and sending out your newsletter to thousands of
subscribers. Just managing your email alone will become a full-time job. You need
help…fast! That help will come to you in the form of an autoresponder which will help
manage daily chores like sending out welcome messages to your new subscribers,
confirming orders and handling frequently asked questions. Having an autoresponder
system frees you up from the tedious chores that can suck your free time away and keep you
from developing new products and coaching clients.
Autoresponders aren’t complicated. In fact, you’ve already seen the benefits of them if
you’ve ever signed up for a newsletter online. The confirmation note you received or first
issue came to you compliments of an autoresponder.
So how do they work? Let’s give you the most common examples of how they’re used.
Newsletter Signup
A visitor to your site likes the content on your site and decides to signup for your FREE
newsletter (especially since they like the FREE gift that’s mentioned), so they enter their
name and email address into a form and click the “submit” button. The HTML script your
webmaster put on your site submits the information to your autoresponder service and the
autoresponder service stores the information and automatically sends out the confirmation
message you set up to handle subscription requests. In this case [email protected] is
the email address that handles requests to be subscribed to your newsletter.
Moments later they receive that message from your autoresponder that welcomes them to
your newsletter and provides them with a link to download their FREE gift. The whole
process is automated and you don’t have to do anything once the HTML code is set up on
your site and the autoresponder is set up. And once that person’s email address is captured
on your autoresponder list, you can quickly and efficiently send them new issues of your
newsletter, announcements of new products and services that you have created.
Request for More Information
If you’re following my advice to write lots of articles with your resource box included at the
bottom, you can have a line in the resource box that says “if you would like more
information about such and such topic, just send a blank email to: [email protected]. You
setup an autoresponder to send out an additional article or two and let the reader know that
you’ve automatically signed them up for your monthly newsletter. Now you’ve got someone
into your prospects list who didn’t even have to visit your site. Pretty powerful stuff!
In fact, you can setup a number of different autoresponders to handle a myriad of requests
and questions that your web-site visitors might have. Everything from sales literature,
article requests, frequently asked questions, new product announcements, and report
requests. All can be set up on separate autoresponders.
For more help on how to explode your e-mail campaigns, check out Corey Rudl’s The
Insider Secrets to E-mail Marketing- Advanced Series" eBook. It’s a 433-page
printable eBook that’s literally an A-to-Z guide, crammed full of step-by-step instructions,
examples, and case studies of absolutely everything you need to know to explode your email campaigns. It will help you grow a super-responsive opt-in list…FAST! This e-book
will help you with everything from generating the highest possible revenue from every email you send, to protecting your business from being wrongly accused of spamming and
knowing how to effectively deal with it if you are and explain when you should mail, how
you should mail, what you should write, and when you should send it so that you are
guaranteed the best possible results from each and every e-mail. It’s an AMAZING resource
to have!
Okay, so you get Corey’s The Insider Secrets to E-mail Marketing- Advanced
Series" eBook and you’re ready to do some promoting, but how do you get your hands on
one of these super-duper-automating devices? You have 3 main choices.
Your Web Host
Depending on who you sign up with, your hosting company will sometimes provide you
with an autoresponder. This might be a good option if you have a small list and want to get
your feet wet by dealing with only one system. Unfortunately, most hosting companies only
allow you 1 or 2 autoresponders and they usually limit the number of people you can send
messages to. One of the hosting companies we originally used limited us to 1,000
subscribers. Obviously you’re going to blow past that number in a matter of weeks, so
you’re going to have to look for other options.
A great option is Third Sphere. They’ve got great packages and you can host a number of
sites for the great same low price and you get unlimited autoresponders.
Free Autoresponders
There are free autoresponders like GetResponse.com that will allow you to use their system
if you allow them to include rotating ads that will appear at the top or bottom of your
messages. This might be a good option if you’re strapped for cash and on a budget, but we
highly recommend you stay away from free autoresponders. Their systems might not be
advanced enough to meet your requirements and let’s be honest with each other. You’re
trying to project a professional image. Do you really want an ad for “Sparky’s Discount
Hosting” showing up at the end of your newsletters? We didn’t think so. Let’s learn about
your last option.
Paid Autoresponder Services
You can also pay money to get your hands on an autoresponder system that doesn’t throw
in ads every time you send out messages to your subscribers. Unfortunately the cost of
autoresponder services can be quite expensive. Expect to pay around $20 to $24 a month
for a quality autoresponder service. The one system that offers a one-time only charge is
AutoResponsePlus, which lets you buy the system for $99 and that’s it. More on this
system in a second.
Having a paid service allows you to send out unlimited messages and set up numerous
autoresponders that can handle requests for different products, questions, and practically
anything else you want to keep separate autoresponders for.
Just note that most autoresponders will increase your monthly price after you reach 10,000
subscribers. Hopefully by that point you’ll have turned quite a few of your subscribers into
paying customers so that they will pay for the entire cost of your autoresponder service each
month.
Some autoresponder services to look into:
www.AutoResponsePlus.com
www.GetResponse.com
www.Aweber.com
Setting Them Up
Most autoresponder sites have tutorials that will walk you through the setup process. Those
that are housed on the autoresponder servers are usually easy to navigate and manage. One
word of caution: back up your database frequently. You don’t want to lose your list if the
company goes under, bars you from using their service because of spam complaints, or any
other calamity that can happen.
If you go with something like Autoresponseplus which is a great piece of software that
sits on your server, you can pay a little extra to have your webmaster install it or their
support team will contract out the installation for you. Total cost for the software will run
you around $100 and to install it, you can either have a tech-savvy friend help you or pay
$50 to $100 to have someone install it for you.
I use Autoresponseplus, despite the fact that my host has free autoresponders.
I’m just used to the system, it’s worked great for me and it was a cheap
investment. The only downside is that you’ll need a separate license for each
domain you host if you want the software to reside on more than one domain. That’s a
fancy way of saying that if you have multiple sites (and I hope you do, one for each of your
many products), you will need to buy multiple licenses to have an autoresponder address
with your domain’s name. For example, to have:
[email protected]
[email protected]
I would have to buy two licenses. I hope that makes sense. If not, drop me a line at
[email protected].
Web Design Software
I don’t want to get too deep into the whole designing of web-sites, because I want to stick to
the basics of creating infoproducts, not the nitty gritty of HTML. If you want to learn more
about designing web-sites, I recommend getting your hands on The Genius Guide to
Web Design. It will tell you everything you need from start to finish on creating web sites
by yourself.
The advice I’m going to give you regarding web design software might not be popular with
other infopreneurs out there, but it’s worked for me and it works for Tom Antion. He’s the
infopreneur who’s currently making around $50,000 per MONTH from his rinky dink,
crappy web-sites. Those are his words, not mine.
You see, there are a lot of different software programs that you can use to actually design
and create your web-sites. The most highly recommended software (and the one my
designer uses) is Dreamweaver. Dreamweaver rocks and it’s easy to use. You can create
“pure” code with it and so on, but I’ll stick with Microsoft Frontpage. Yes, Frontpage code
isn’t pure and it adds extra lines of code to your web pages and the pages load a
microsecond slower, but who cares. It’s easy to use and get this, it came FREE with my
company’s purchase of Microsoft XP. How’s that for a bargain. ☺
If you’re not that fortunate to have XP, then see if you can locate a copy of Frontpage
Express which is a free program, but doesn’t have all the bells and whistles of the standard
version of Frontpage. If you want to try something new and go the free route, you can
always checkout www.Download.com and see what HTML and web-site development
software they have for free. My recommendation is to go with Frontpage or make the
investment in Dreamweaver. Either will do.
So the question should be in your head: how can Fabio be serious about making money on
the Internet and not really care what kind of software he uses? Wouldn’t he invest in
Dreamweaver and make sure his web-sites are fancy and pretty?
Nope. I want ugly sites. Check that. I want ugly sites that make money.
Simplicity Sells
If you take anything away from this section of the manual, it should be:
SIMPLICITY SELLS!!!
I learned this the hard way after trying to design pretty sites; with all the bells and whistles
and I found out that people just don’t care! After reading Killer Mini Sites, you’ll realize
that you don’t need the fancy stuff; you just have to stick to the basics to make a ton of
money!
Your mini sites should be nothing more than a well-written and well-tested sales letter. You
don’t have to spend thousands of dollars on site design to make thousands of dollars in
sales.
Simple Sites = Big Profits!
Look at all the big names in the business – Yanik Silver, Marlon Sanders, Armand
Morin, and even Corey Rudl (his product sites) – and you’ll see that they’re very simple
and straightforward. They don’t use Flash technology and they don’t do anything that
would distract you from the main objective of their sites: getting you to buy something.
In Closing, Spend a Little to Learn A Lot
I know we’ve covered a lot of ground during this step and we’re about to cover a lot more
during the next mini-step of Developing Traffic Builders, but if you have the right resources,
it’s not hard to learn how to create killer mini sites and autoresponder series that will help
you sell those products you’ve worked so hard on creating.
The below four resources are must-haves in my book because they’ve helped me so much in
developing my selling system. I’ve always operated from the mindset that it’s smart to
spend a little money and invest in learning something once that will pay off the rest of my
life. I hope you’ll agree.
ThirdSphere Hosting
Killer Mini Sites
Genius Guide to Web Design
AutoResponsePlus
These next two offer some of the best emails and autoresponder series that the pros have
used to sell millions of dollars worth of products. Yanik Silver got the big name gurus to
send him all their best emails and he packaged them into two must-have products. Now
you don’t have to go searching for e-zine courses or autoresponder emails that work. You
can just swipe them from the pros:
Autoresponder Magic
Million Dollar Emails
S
tep ##7a
7a –– D
evelop TTraffic
raffic B
uilders
Step
Develop
Builders
You must get new visitors to your site and there are a few must-have resources and must-do
things that you need to…er do. Now it’s up to you to decide how in-depth and how much
effort you want to put into creating traffic builders, but I tell all my coaching clients to focus
on creating a few of them and then work on them weekly. If you’re not working constantly
on trying to generate new traffic builders and on promoting your site, you’re not going to
sell anything beyond a handful of products every month. Your goal should be to sell a ton of
infoproducts, not a handful.
So after that introductory spiel, what the heck is a traffic builder? It’s simply something
that drives people to your web-site. In my mind almost anything that gets people to your
site can be considered a traffic builder, but generally speaking infopreneurs focus on the
following ones:
•
Writing Articles
•
Publishing an E-zine
•
Mini-eCourses
•
Giving away eBooks
•
Book Excerpts
•
Special Reports
•
Your Own Affiliate Program
•
Anything else you can think of
While this step might be the furthest thing from your mind because you’re focusing on
polishing and editing your infoproduct, it’s important that you develop solid traffic builders.
After all, once your product is done and your sales letter is pulling at a healthy clip, your
only job is to drive traffic to your site. The best way to get traffic to your site is to use a
multitude of traffic builders and the sooner you get started on them, the sooner you can use
them to drive people to your web-site(s).
I hate reinventing the wheel and if I’ve written something before that I think is good, I try to
reuse it or put a spin on it to create a new product out of it. I learned this from watching Jay
Conrad Levinson and Robert Kiyosaki in Action. So with that in mind, here’s a brief excerpt
from the e-book I co-wrote with Matt Bacak called Become an Expert in 30 Days…or
less! that will take you through writing articles and publishing your e-zine.
Finding a Home/Market for Your Articles
We talked about finding and subscribing to industry trade journals in our discussion of “How
do you gain your expertise?” but we wanted to briefly touch upon it in greater detail in this
section because it relates to the subject of finding a home for your articles.
Now that you’ve written an article or two you’ve got to get it in the hands of editors.
Online World
If you’re trying to find ezines to run your articles in, you can take one of two routes: sign up
for one of the many services on the net (or buy the software) that instantly submits your
articles to dozens of web-sites or do the dirty work yourself and find the editors yourself.
We actually prefer doing the dirty work and here’s why. The Internet is rapidly expanding
and changing. Someone who might have been hot a couple of months ago or even a few
weeks ago, might have been leapfrogged by the competition. People’s email addresses
and web-sites change, that’s just part of the business.
Looking for the information yourself also forces you to go out there and learn what the
competition is doing and you can tweak your articles and your pitch in lieu of what you’ve
found.
You can also tailor your message better if you’ve actually visited the editor’s site and even
interacted with their readers if there is a message board on the web-site.
Offline World
There are two main resources that will help you find the names of publications and where to
submit your articles: Bacon’s Publicity Checker and Writer’s Market.
Bacon’s is very expensive, but most large libraries will carry a copy. We suggest you visit
your local library before you shell out money for a book you may or may not use. Don’t get
us wrong, Bacon’s is a goldmine of information. It will tell you the circulation of each
publication and journal and give you the names of the editors, along with their addresses
and contact information.
We’re not going to cover offline publishers in that great of detail here, but if you want to find
magazines that would be appropriate for your material, you only have to use two resources:
Writer’s Market which is a huge book that’s published every year and Bacon’s Publicity
Checker. Bacon’s is an excellent resource to have if you’re really interested in finding the
movers in shakers in the media world. It’s expensive though, so we suggest you go to your
local library and see if they have a copy.
The Writer's Market is sold in most bookstores and you can get it at Amazon.com as well.
If you’re serious about getting your articles in print, then this is a must have Resource.
Okay, now let’s get back to online publishers and publications…
Will Publishers Really Run Your Articles?
The answer is simply YES! Most trade journals don’t have big budgets and they rely on the
help from industry practitioners to help them write articles and fill out the pages within a
particular issue. Otherwise they’d have to pay journalists and other writers to do it and
they’d go belly-up in a manner of months. So the truth is they need you just as much as
you need them, don’t forget this critical point. Especially when you’re feeling a bit
overwhelmed by the thought of calling up an editor or writer for a magazine.
Grab Their Attention
Chances are if you’re submitting your articles to big publishers online or offline they’ve got
several dozen requests every week to run articles from aspiring infopreneurs and would-be
experts. You need a way to stand out from the pack instantaneously and you do that first
by having a great title. You need to craft titles that say they’re going to solve a common
problem of the editor’s readers have or it should seek to expose a scam, offer great money
saving tips, and so on.
Writing about issues occurring right now in the headlines and news means that your
information will be timely and highly relevant to the reader. You’ll also have a greater
chance of getting your articles accepted by editors who like to keep their magazines fresh
and on the leading edge.
It’s a Numbers Game
Don’t just send off your articles to one or two “must have” publishers. You need to send
your articles out to A LOT of publishers in order to get published. The process of getting
published is a numbers game. If you send out your article to one or two and you get shot
down, then what did you accomplish? Not much. But if you sent them out to ten or twenty,
you’ve got a greater chance of an editor “biting” and offering to publish your article.
Do Your Homework
As we just stated, we teach our clients to go out and spend some time researching and
learning the market for their articles. You should already be subscribed to the major
magazines in your niche and know the format and type of articles that are in them.
By knowing the magazines inside and out, you can tailor your pitch to an editor by saying
“this article would be perfect for you advice column” or “I know your readers will want to
learn about these promotion techniques in your ‘Grow Your Business’ section.” This shows
that you know the magazine and that you have their reader in mind. Most writers and
would-be experts don’t take the time to do their homework and they land in the
REJECTION pile because of it. Do your homework to improve your odds of acceptance.
Contacting the Editor: By Email and by Phone
The two main ways you’re going to reach editors is via email or the phone. The phone is
the preferred method because it’s too easy to delete emails and it’s easier to tailor your
pitch when you’ve got a live person on the other end of the phone.
The Editorial Calendar
Most publications plan their issues months or even years in advance. They have a
calendar that outlines the topics and types of issues they want to cover. By planning
they’re better able to get their magazines out on time.
You can get your hands on the editorial calendar simply by asking for it and saying “If you
send me your editorial calendar I can write you articles that fit that issues theme.” You can
then call up the editor or assistant from time to time and pitch story ideas that will mesh well
with the issue’s theme. If they don’t bite, fine, you didn’t waste your time writing an article.
But if they do bite, you know you’ll be working on an article that will get serious
consideration.
Of course the easiest way to get your articles published is to start your own online
newsletter or ezine as they’re called. The next step in the process will be covered shortly.
Start Publishing an E-zine NOW
Publishing an e-zine is one of the fastest and cheapest ways to start promoting yourself on
the Internet. Everyone knows that the profit is in the list, but if you don’t have an ezine,
you’re missing one of the fastest and easiest ways to get a big profitable list. Your ezine
will become one of the most effective ways that you can market your products and services.
Your ezine will:
•
•
Establish you as an expert in your niche
Give you credibility within your niche
Soft sell to people your products and services
Allow you to earn money as an affiliate when you promote other people’s products
Make money selling ad space (if you chose to go this route)
Get JV partners to notice you and ask to do deals with you
•
And much, much more…
•
•
•
•
Don’t know where to start?
Don’t sweat it. None of us knew where to start when we first took the plunge. We just
threw stuff against the wall and see what stuck. You don’t have to do that. Just follow this
simple plan:
•
•
Free or Paid? Will you charge for your newsletter or not?
Subject? What will your e-zine be about?
Determine Frequency of Publishing – How often will you send out your e-zine?
Learn from Others – Borrow with pride by using layouts & formats of other e-zines
Get Your Content – Write your own articles and find articles by other authors
•
Create Your Ezine Home Page
•
•
•
•
•
•
Get an Autoresponder
Just Publish It!
Get it Listed!
Free or Paid?
One of the most cost-effective ways to help spread your “word” and get your articles in front
of highly targeted readers is to start your own newsletter. You can do this via a print
newsletter or via an online version, or what’s called an electronic magazine or e-zine for
short. An e-zine is the preferred route for Experts in Training. The startup costs are
virtually non-existent and you can test the waters with your niche category, build your list of
subscribers, then make the decision whether or not you need to create a print version of
your newsletter.
Subject Matter
What are you going to write about? Well you’re going to publish an e-zine that deals with
the niche that you’re trying to establish yourself in. Don’t worry if you think it’s too narrow to
contain you right now. As long as you stick with the same genre or category, you can
always morph the newsletter and change it to suit your needs and the needs of your
subscribers.
How Often Should You Publish?
When you’re just getting started it might seem like a lot of work to publish an e-zine every
two weeks, but you should strive for this benchmark. This will put you in front of your
prospects every 14 days. That’s just my opinion. There’s a lot of back and forth as to the
best time to publish your e-zine. A lot of e-zine owners tend to send out their newsletters
on Monday because they’ve had a chance to put it together over the weekend. If you
publish on Monday, you’ve got a lot of competition not only from other e-zines, but the
typical Monday Morning Fire Drills and meetings and so on that we’ve all got going on in
our own lives. The weekends are times where people are out and about and not really
thinking about making money on the web or building their businesses. They’ve hopefully
been doing that for the past 5 days. The weekends are a time to relax, unwind and get
ready for a new week of challenges. That leaves only four other days. Let’s not drag this
one out.
According to Internet Marketing Guru Ralph Wilson, of www.wilsonweb.com, the best
days are Tuesday and Wednesday and we’d have to agree. Here’s the link to his survey
results:
http://www.wilsonweb.com/art/email/email_days.htm
So again, I try to publish my newsletter every two weeks, but sometimes life gets in the
way, so I use the following strategy to help me out….
Super Tip – You can send out little notes to you list updating them of current events, new
things happening in the industry, as well as some personal updates from you. This doesn’t
have to be a full blown newsletter, so you don’t have to worry about finding articles,
formatting stuff and so on. Just a quick blurb to your list to stay in touch and let them know
that you’re looking out for them and that you care about them. This will go a long way
toward helping you build a relationship with your list.
Learn from Others
Subscribe to Several E-zines. Simply go to Google and type in keywords that relate to or
describe your niche. Scroll through the results and visit the web-sites. If the content and
the site looks good to you, and they have an e-zine, sign up for it. If they have an archive
for previous issues of their newsletters, even better. Print out the ones that you really
gravitate toward. Now you have a few examples of the outline and format of e-zines that
you like and can copy (the format, not the content that is).
If you haven’t done so already, visit our web-sites and sign up for our e-zines. We’ve spent
years perfecting the layout, copy, and tone of them. Luckily you don’t have to invest that
much time to learn from e-zines that sell. Check out my main newsletter and you’ll instantly
get access to great articles, resources, product reviews, as well as a sample e-zine that you
can copy (I mean borrow with pride from):
Cash More Checks E-zine: www.CashMoreChecks.com
Million Dollar Dream E-zine: www.FabmanSecrets.com
A Sample Ezine
I’m not going to spent a lot of time on how to write an ezine. It’s a simple enough process
and if you get stuck, just borrow a format from an ezine that you like and you’ll be a
publisher in the matter of a few hours! Here’s a sample outline of an ezine:
Hi John:
Insert a quick welcome message and update your subscribers on anything.
=============================
Table of Contents
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Article #1
Article #2
Resources You Can Use
Book Excerpt
Client Testimonials (if appropriate)
Contact Information
=============================
Ad: Insert a small 3-5 line ad for one of your books, tapes, or coaching program
=============================
Article #1
=============================
Article #2
=============================
Resources You Can Use
=============================
Book Excerpt:
=============================
Client Testimonials
=============================
Contact Information and Legal Garbage
Thanks to the CAN SPAM act you now have to include some legal copy and your full contact
information.
=============================
Must Have Resource: TextPad
You’re going to find that you can’t simply type something out in Microsoft Word and paste it
into your autoresponder or broadcast email system and send it out to your subscribers.
You need to convert your ezine into text. It’s a lot easier than it sounds.
Just go to www.textpad.com and download a free version of their text writing software. It’s
a very simple tool to use. Mainly you’re going to be looking to change the “apostrophes”
and “quotation marks” in your writing because when these marks are sent through the
autoresponders, they get all jumbled up.
Get Your Content – Writing Articles
I’m going to go into a lot of detail in this step because writing articles is really an important
weapon in your arsenal to promote yourself and it’s probably the first way you’re going to
get your feet wet when it comes to marketing and promoting yourself. It’s the way most
gurus get started. They write an article about a particular sub-segment of their industry and
then another and another and soon they become the pre-eminent expert in that niche
they’ve helped create.
Even if you’ve never written an article in your life (don’t start having a panic attack on us)
you can pound one out in less than an hour if you follow the following formula:
List out your topics
Pick a topic to write about
Just start writing about that topic
Write like you’re talking to a friend
Edit your article/Add in research information
Add your resource box at the end.
4 Things to Strive for with Your Articles
You want to write articles that will have information and strategies that they can immediately
put to use. It doesn’t matter whether you structure the information in the form of an “advice”
article or a how-to article, you should always strive to have your articles be:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Relevant
To the point
Thought-provoking (filled with “aha’s”)
Immediately actionable
Most articles will be between 500 to 800 words for online articles and you might go as high
as 1,000 to 1,200 for offline articles.
We know we said that you need to use self-promotion in order to achieve guru status, but
when you write an article it should NOT be 100 percent blatant self-promotion. Editors hate
these kind of “articles” and if you submit a “sales piece for your business” instead of a wellwritten, actionable article, you’re going to be remanded to the REJECT pile. DON”T DO IT!
You want to write articles that address the major concerns and problems people are having
within your industry. Things like how to achieve better results, get more done, make more
money from their business, motivate their employees, and so on. The articles that get read
are how-to articles that are filled with actionable steps that get the reader to really pause
and reflect on their business or personal life, then strike out and take action based on the
information in your article.
Yes, it’s a tall order, but once you learn the basics of writing a killer article, you’ll find it very
easy to write your articles in less than a day.
Topics
The topics of your articles will be pulled straight from your speeches or book and/or the
headlines. But if you write about stuff in your book, won’t editors pull out the REJECTED
stamp because you’re not offering any “new” news? The simple answer is no. Most of the
information that appears in their magazines is recycled material by either their staff or
freelancers and if you remember our discussion earlier about information, you’ll know why.
Most of what’s needed in life is already known and there are few truly new ideas in a given
industry. The books have been written on getting out of debt, managing your finances, and
so on. You’d be hard pressed to come up with a new slant on things every time you tried to
write an article, so don’t sweat it. Writing articles that rehash your materials will serve to
reinforce your message and you’ll come off as an expert on the topic. After all, you’ve not
only written the book on the topic, you’ve also written dozen of articles that appeared in the
industry’s leading magazines. Now how’s that for proof that you’re an expert in your niche?
A Word of Caution: Avoid Creating Blatant Advetorials
While you don’t have to reinvent the wheel per se with your articles, you should strive to
create something that will be of benefit to your readers. You can’t just repackage the
material from your books or seminars and slap on a byline or resource box and be done
with it. That’s nothing more than a blatant advertorial for you and your services and
publishers HATE THIS KIND OF ARTICLE.
Now back to what to write on. Take out a sheet of blank paper and a pen and start
brainstorming a list of things you can write about within your niche. Do this for about 5 to
10 minutes. You should be staring at a bunch of different topics and strategies.
Then you take each one of those and break down the topic into subtopics that you can write
about. Go ahead, just do it. We’ll explain why in a second.
Your List of Future Articles
Now you have a list of various topics that you can write about, but the next step is to make
them into article titles or “headlines.” What you do is take a topic, say getting out of debt
and you create a title for an article about getting out of debt. Then you write another title
and another and another using the subtopics that you created.
The easiest way to come up with titles is to use the following phrases:
[X] Ways to ………..
How I ………
How You Can ……..
How to …….
[X] Simple Ways to …….
The Secret ……
Stop ……. and Start …….
Don’t [Do X] ……..
We’ve found that the best titles to articles contain a number in the title. Such as “7 Simple
Steps to Get Out of Bad Debt for Good” or “4 Ways to Get More Traffic from Your
Autoresponder.” Don’t worry about having the “7” or “4” ways right now. Just create the
title, then brainstorm the steps. You can always change the title after you’re done writing
the article.
We’re going to cover titles and headlines a little later on in this ebook because they’re that
important, but for now, just follow us through the process of taking the topic “get out of debt”
and creating several article titles/topics to write about:
•
•
•
•
•
7 Simple Steps to Get Out of Bad Debt for Good
How I Got Credit Card Companies to Stop Calling Me
How to Instantly Put Your Debt Repayment Strategy on Autopilot
13 Ways to Refinance Your Bad Debt
And so on….
- 156 -
© 2005, Fabio Marciano – All Rights Reserved
Prioritize Your List
Before you start firing up the word processor, we just want to give you one piece of advice
that has served us well: prioritize your list. The tendency of most writers is to pick the first
topic on their list and start writing. You shouldn’t do this. Take five minutes to number the
topics/titles in order of importance. Are there any “sexy” titles on there that editors will
salivate over? Are their any topics that will engage readers and you can write them in no
time flat? Then these are the articles you should write IMMEDIATELY and save the rest for
last.
Take 5 minutes to prioritize your topics/titles in order of importance.
Writing Your Articles
The above titles all came out of the topic “get out of debt” during a brainstorming session.
The reason you do this is to create a list of articles that you can write around a central topic
or theme. Then you go about writing the articles using the simple 1-2-3 process we use to
write articles in less than 30 minutes.
3 Steps to Getting Your Articles Written in 30 Minutes or Less
We hate to see writers struggle to write articles on subjects they know like the back of their
hand. The reason most struggle is that they’re trying to cram in too much information into
an article that’s supposed to only be 500 to 800 words long. The idea of creating sub-topics
and writing about them should solve this problem.
The second reason is that most writers are used to writing chapters on the topics and they
don’t know how to write simple, yet effective articles. We’ve got a simple 1-2-3 process that
we use to get our thoughts on the page and create articles in less than 30 minutes. We
think you should try out this strategy with your own writing.
Step One: The Opening
Take the title and write a four or five sentence opening paragraph that will tell you about
what you’re about to cover in your article and why it’s absolutely critical that they read the
article or they’ll continue to experience – pain, suffering, lost money, lost time, less freedom
– and so on if they don’t read the article.
Step Two: The Body
After you have the opening done, start listing your different tips or strategies in the order
that they should be done. Now write a few sentences about each of the items, elaborating
where necessary. When you use this “list” format, it’s much easier to come up with a bullet
point or two about what they have to do. Don’t worry about the language and the number
of sentences. Just list out the key information your reader needs to know.
Step Three: The Conclusion
Here you simply reinforce why they should take action on the information you just provided,
you tell them what they’ll lose if they don’t and then you end on an upbeat note. You can
add in a testimonial type of message, such as:
“Many of my clients have used the above 7 Step Formula to get out of bad debt and you
should too.”
This type of one-liner reinforces that you know what you’re talking about and it further
reinforces that what you’re writing about really works.
How-to and List Type Articles are EASY to Write
Again, this is just one way to write articles, but if you’re writing articles primarily online, the
“how-to” and “list format” articles have been the biggest sellers when it comes to getting
publishers to run them. Don’t be intimidated by them. Tips articles are really just a list of
things or tips that you’re giving to someone, preceded by an opening paragraph and
followed by a closing paragraph. Just brainstorm a topic; come up with a list of remedies to
the problem, then set about writing an intro. Grab the reader’s attention from the get-go,
then insert the list you created and add a line or two after each tip then create the closing.
Just Freakin’ Write
Don’t complicate the process. Just start writing. Period. End of story.
Now that you have the topics/titles for a slew of articles, you know which ones you should
write first, you have a simple process for writing them, now the last step is to start writing.
Don’t worry about writing the perfect article right off the bat. Just start writing. Don’t worry
about the length of the article or if you’re being clear. Stop agonizing over your choice of
words and the grammar or anything that’s stopping you from writing at a healthy clip.
Just pretend you’re writing to a friend or one of your clients and get your thoughts on paper.
After you’re done you can go back and edit your work.
For now, just freakin’ write!
Write to One Person
This technique is something that you must learn to do, whether you’re writing headlines,
copy, or articles. The best way to connect with a reader is to be personal and write as if
you’re talking to one person and one person alone. This person is what Stephen King calls
his “Constant Reader” and others call their “ideal reader.” Whatever you call them, make
sure that you’re writing on the personal level. This means that your articles and books
should be peppered with a lot of “you’s” and ‘you” and “your” and so on, not “all of you” and
“some of you.”
Write to one person and one person alone. Your readers will connect better with the
material because as they read it, they’ll feel like you’re talking directly to them…and you
should be!
Be Different
What’s your twist on an old subject or what’s unique about your article? Don’t submit
articles on topics, ideas, and strategies that have been written “to death” by would-be
writers. You need to come up with some fresh ideas that are going to be new or at
minimum, refreshing to read. You want to keep your readers in mind and the response you
want to get out of them is to have them either print out the article, rip it out of the magazine
or run to your web-site for more information. You don’t want them to say:
“Oh, another article on [insert what you’re writing about].”
Then flip the page.
You engage your reader by providing fresh perspectives on old topics or by coming up with
some really breakthrough ideas and strategies.
Remember to be different and take a chance. You’ll find your articles getting accepted and
“running” in publications more often.
Your Resource Box and Byline
Whether you’re writing an article for an online ezine or for a “real world” magazine, you’re
going to want to have a way for the readers to get in touch with you or at minimum get to
your web-site. If you have a 1-800 number, then you can include this along with a short bio
of yourself and your company. Most editors don’t mind adding a line or two about your
business at the end of an article because it adds credibility to you and reflects well on their
magazine.
We love writing articles online because we can include a hyperlink to our web-sites, as well
as tell the reader that there’s an incentive for joining our newsletter (there should always be
an incentive/freebie/compelling reason/bribe for someone to give you their email address.
Example of a Resource Box:
Fabio "fabman" Marciano is the # 1 Personal and Financial Freedom Coach on the Internet. He is
the author of the best-seller The Secrets of Wealth and he's shared his investing principles with
thousands of people and his CASH FLOW CALCULATOR has helped countless others get their
finances back into shape.
Get your hands on his FREE newsletter, helpful articles and FRE.E chapters from his best-selling
book The Secrets of Wealth at:
http://www.fabmansecrets.com
It's Time to Live the Life You've Imagined…
Yes, my resource box is kind of long (just like his writing), but it serves its purpose. If an
editor balks at publishing that long of a resource box, I send them my cut down version:
Fabio "fabman" Marciano is the # 1 Personal and Financial Freedom Coach on the Internet. He is
the author of the best-seller The Secrets of Wealth.
Get your hands on his FREE newsletter, helpful articles and FRE.E chapters from his best-selling
book The Secrets of Wealth at: http://www.fabmansecrets.com
It's Time to Live the Life You've Imagined…
Now let’s get to bylines which are typically run in offline magazines and newspapers.
Example of a Byline:
Fabio Marciano is one of the pre-eminent infoproduct creators and marketers of his generation. He
is the author of Instant Niche Products, The One Minute Ebook and Become an Expert in 30
Days…or less! Reach him at www.CashMoreChecks.com or [email protected] today
to see how he can help you start your online business from scratch!
Need Help Writing???
There are a number of books out there that can help you with your writing. Obviously you’ll
need a good thesaurus and dictionary, but if you are using a word processor they’re already
built-in these days. Two books that we’ve used that deal with writing more from an
authoring books perspective are:
100 Things Every Writer Needs to Know by Scott Edelstein
1,818 Ways to Write Better & Get Published by Scott Edelstein
Again, these are just two books that we’ve found particularly valuable in helping shape our
writing, but there are some online tools that you can use to improve your writing.
Online Writing Tools
Quotes
Peppering your writing with a few well-timed quotes will not only keep your writing
interesting, if you select them correctly they can help reinforce the fact that you know what
you’re talking about. Having a well-known expert essentially reinforce a point you’re
making adds that level of credibility that we all strive for in our writing.
http://www.bartleby.com/
Thesaurus
If your word processor’s database of words isn’t cutting it, you can always use some online
resources like:
Webster's Hypertext Dictionary at http://m-w.com/netdict.htm
and
Roget's Online Thesaurus http://www.thesaurus.com
Clichés
Fabio is notorious for using clichés in his writing and this little site will give you thousands to
choose from.
http://www.westegg.com/cliche/
Others
We’re sure there are dozens of others out there that you can use. Just do a search on
Google.com for what you’re looking for and you’re bound to come across 2,467 sites.
Less CAN Be MORE
You don’t have to write a thesis every time you send out your ezine. You can just use the
template you got from someone else’s newsletter, insert your own information, then paste in
the one or two articles and you could be done with your newsletter. If you want to add a
quote here and there or a “Must Use Resources” or “Ask the Editor” section, go for it. The
key is to keep it simple when you first start out and just get your ezine out there. As you
gain confidence and read other ezines, you’ll begin to feel more at ease writing your
newsletter.
Add Your Personal Touch
And once you’re more comfortable writing articles and publishing your ezine, it’s time to
inject it with a little of your personality. Add life to the boring subject matter or provide your
readers with more resources and benefits than your competition. You want to make it so
your readers can wait to receive your newsletter. When you encourage readers to write to
you and submit their own articles or links to their site, you’ll find yourself with a burgeoning
online following.
WARNING: Just remember, it’s your newsletter and the idea is to promote you, your
products, and what you’re selling. Over the years we’ve seen hard-working ezine
publishers lose the “pulling” power of their ezines because they’ve filled it with free
subscriber ads, subscriber articles and links. Don’t fall into the same trap.
Now to beat this idea to death…
Feature Your Articles in the Newsletter
One of the biggest mistakes we see new ezine editors making is featuring articles by every
guru on the block but they forget to include their own articles. Your ezine is a
PROMOTIONAL TOOL for you, your products and your services. It does you no good if
you’re constantly showcasing the knowledge of others. Sure it’s an easy way to get started,
compiling articles from others, but you’ve got to cut the cord at some point and publish your
own stuff. This is CRITICAL to your success. Remember, people have subscribed to your
ezine to hear what you have to say, not some other guru. They already belong to the
guru’s newsletter. Give them a piece of you and your insights into the topic you’re
supposed to be an expert on.
Get Your Content - Get Help From Others
If you’re having trouble writing articles for your ezine or having trouble getting it started,
don’t despair. You can contact those same ezine owners that you’re benchmarking and tell
them that you would like to publish one or more of their articles. 99% of them will say YES!
because it’s free publicity and exposure for them. If you find an ezine owner that’s
particularly helpful, ask them if you can run your ezine by them before you publish it. Not
everyone is going to be willing to take the time to help out, but each and every “big” internet
marketer out there started right where you are today and they’re going to help you out.
Why? Because someone helped them out and they’re giving back. Sounds corny, but it’s
the truth. Try this out and you’ll prove us right.
Two great sources for quality articles that you can use are:
Ezine Articles Directory
www.EzineArticles.com
Idea Marketers Article Directory
www.IdeaMarketers.com
I’m sure there will be many others that you will come across within your niche, so be sure to
bookmark them in your favorites section of your browser and visit them frequently!
Now let’s move on to some more important stuff.
Money On Your Mind
I understand that you’re probably going to create an e-zine as a creative outlet and a way to
get your content in front of as many people as possible, but don’t lose sight of one of your
most important goals for your e-zine: to make money.
That’s right. You need to make money from your e-zine.
This is not to say that the sole reason to have an e-zine is to make money, but it IS an
important piece of your profit pipeline. You CAN continue to help people with whatever
niche you’re focusing on, but if you start to lose sight of making money, your little e-zine
and online ventures will burn a hole in your pocket. As my good friend Mike Litman puts it:
“Are you trying to save the world or are you trying to make some money?”
Which one are you trying to do? You CAN help thousands upon thousands of people and
make money in the process. It’s what Tony Robbins has done, it’s what Dr. Phil has done,
it’s what Oprah has done and you too can make money while helping people. Let’s learn
how!
Building Relationships
Ask any good salesperson what’s the most important thing to create with a prospect and
they’ll tell you a relationship. Your e-zine helps you build a relationship with each and every
subscriber. Over the course of time, you transform a subscriber into a reader and a reader
into a buyer and a buyer into a customer and a customer into a lifelong customer. Put your
personality into your articles and your “Notes from the Editor” section of your e-zine. Give
them freebies and excerpts from your e-books to deliver that value to them. Tell them you
want to hear from them and when they reach out to you, respond quickly.
Your e-zine will help establish your credibility as an expert in your niche. If your articles are
easy to read and help your readers with their problems and issues they’re facing, their
respect for your advice and what you have to say will increase over time. And by making
references to your books, e-books, and other products, readers will seek out your other
products to help them learn more and help them overcome their business and personal
issues.
An even better way to connect with your readers is to frequently remind them that you’re
there for them and you’re available to help answer their questions. When a reader reaches
out to you and you respond to them in a timely manner with a well-thought out response
that’s personalized, they’ll never look for anyone else to help them. You’re their Go-To
Guru. Period. End of story. What a nice place to be in.
What do they want and need? Ask them!
Ask and you shall receive. It’s timeless advice, so why aren’t you doing it? Why aren’t you
regularly polling and asking your subscribers what they want and what they are looking to
get from you? If you spend the few minutes it will take to craft a simple little email asking
what they’re looking for, you’ll be surprised at the wealth of information you will receive
back. Or if you want to get a little fancy, you can send them a link to a survey on your site
(or include the survey in your email) that will accomplish the same task.
The key is to find out what they want from your relationship with them. They’ll even tell you
how much they’re willing to pay for your advice, your books, your e-books and other
information products. Then you can use that information to create your business plan,
create your information products and even write your sales copy. Such a simple little trick,
but hardly anyone is using it these days. I’m actually guilty of waiting too long to use this
little tactic.
I grew my list to 19,000 subscribers before I even asked these simple questions. What a
mistake! The result of a simple little survey prompted me to shift gears and offer a
coaching program that was geared toward not only helping people improve their finances
and money management skills, but also overcome their fears and fight that dreaded
disease called procrastination.
Promote Your Own Products. Duh, why didn’t I think of that?
We’re constantly amazed when we read other newsletters at how infrequently those ezine
owners pitch their own products. You shouldn’t be afraid to use your ezine to promote your
products. After all, if the reader is there to learn more about your niche, it stands to reason
that they’d be interested in your products that are on the same subject.
WARNING: Don’t SPAM and/or bombard your readers with constant sales letters and
offers. While it’s okay to include an occasional “advertorial” or article with links to your
product sales pages, you don’t want to go overboard. We hate ezine owners who are
blatantly just sending out sales letters and adding little to nothing in the way of educational
and action-oriented content.
If you want to send those blatant advertorials or SOLO ads for your products, limit them to
no more than twice a month.
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
That was just a pretty long excerpt from the e-book I wrote with Matt Bacak
called Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!, but it’s indicative of the type of
information you’ll get when you read the easy-to-follow, “paint-by-thenumbers” program. See for yourself at Become an Expert in 30 Days…or less!
=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
The Remaining 4 Steps to Getting Publishing an E-zine
I’m not going to go into too much detail on the last four steps of getting your e-zine off the
ground because we’ll be here all day! Seriously, if you’ve developed a web page for your
sales letter already, then you just have to follow the same process for creating a home page
for your e-zine. Visit some sites that are within your niche and find out how they’re laying
out their articles archive section and so on. Then create your own. REMEMBER to put
your subscription box on EVERY page of your content site. You never know how someone
will find your web-site and what page they’ll come to you from (page with only an article on
it, resources section, etc.), so you have to give them every opportunity to sign up as possible!
We’ll cover Autoresponders in detail in just a moment and the last task, Just Publish It!, is
self explanatory. Just do it! Get that darned thing out to your list and keep on top of it,
okay? The last step is to Get it Listed! By listed I mean listed in a number of e-zine
directories that are out there on the Internet. The list of directories changes month to
month as sites fall off the map and new ones come on the scene. Check out Directory of
Ezines. It’s one of the biggest and best directories out there. To find the rest, just do a
search under Google and you’ll find a thousand of them or you can just ask around on a
discussion forum within your niche. Just post a question like “What are the best e-zines
that I should subscribe to?” and you’ll get enough responses to satisfy your swipe file!
Now I’m not going to spend too much time on the next three traffic generators, because the
first one is stupid-simple to set up and the last two I’ve written full-length e-books on an
they’re worth the investment of your time and money to go out and get and read and put
into action and profit from. I hope that makes sense. With that, let’s talk about mini-ecourses.
Incentives to Join
If someone is going to give you their email address, they’re going to want something of
value immediately in return. Don’t worry, you don’t have to work too hard or even pay
money to find bonuses that your potential subscribers are going to love.
Mini-e-Courses
If you’ve been online for more than a week and you’ve gone to several sites of people selling
information products, you’ve likely encountered a pitch to sign up for a FREE e-course or
mini-e-course on a particular topic.
Mini-e-courses are so important because you gain access to someone’s email address and
their inbox. Over the course of 5 to 7 messages, as you teach them whatever you’re teaching
them, you begin to build a relationship with them. They begin to trust you and get a “free”
taste of your writing style and your level of expertise.
I love free e-courses and you should too. You get to spread out your messages over the
course of 7-14 days or longer and you get to put yourself in front of a potential buyer
multiple times. And you probably know that you need to get yourself in front of a prospect
7 or 8 times before they will become interested in what you have to offer or just plain pay
attention to you because of all the “noise” in the marketplace. By noise I mean the total
bombardment of advertising messages that people are hit with every day.
An e-course lets you cut through the clutter and deliver value to your prospects. More
importantly, you can put little ads for your products and services at the end of the lessons
you’re sending out. Let me repeat that for dramatic effect so you understand just how
important this concept is:
You can put little ads for your products and services at the end of the lessons
you’re sending out!!!
If you don’t have an e-course yet, then you MUST get one. Subscribers love them and your
bank account will love them once you start ringing up some sales of your products or
affiliate products as a direct result of your messages that are inside your e-courses.
How To Create an e-course
Let’s not waste any time. Here are the steps. I’m not going to elaborate because I feel it’s
self-explanatory to a degree:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Create a Killer Title for Your e-course: Should describe a benefit or simple steps to
solve a problem
Map out an outline of the course over the next couple of days or weeks
Write or compile the articles and information that will go into each new lesson
Ad in an ad at the bottom of every message or at minimum, include a signature file
that points people back to your site
Load up the messages to an autoresponder sequence
Test the sequence by subscribing to the e-course
Post it to your site and advertise it in your articles and on forums when you’re ready.
Just remember not to SPAM folks!
Free e-books
Seth Godin, author of Unleasing the Ideavirus, unleashed his own virus through the
launch of this little ebook. He gave it away on his site and hundreds of thousands of copies
were downloaded. You read that right. Hundred of thousands of copies. He collected all
the emails and shortly after the launch of the e-book, he did a small production run of the
print version and sold them for $40 a pop. Very savvy.
But back to you. We’re not saying that you should give away free ebooks with the intention
of turning them into physical books, although you can. What we’re getting at is that people
love free stuff and if you’re giving them something that has a high perceived value,
somewhere between $9.97 and $47 for an ebook, you’ll get a lot of people to give you their
email addresses.
Give Away Someone Else’s e-book
Having trouble writing a second e-book (after just having completed your first), don’t sweat
it: give away someone else’s e-book. While this option is less desirable because you’re trying
to build your name and your reputation, if you’re pressed for time, you might try reaching
out to another infopreneur and ask them if they have an e-book or special report they’d like
to give away to new subscribers on your site. This is how I started out with my traffic
builder, but over time I developed a slew of my own giveaways because it’s my site and I’m
there to promote me, not somebody else.
Now if you want to create an e-book with minimal effort, you could always string together a
bunch of articles that you found through the Internet. Now that requires effort on your
part, so it’s less than ideal, but there is an alternative. If you use a resource like Push
Button Publishing, you instantly get access to hundreds of articles that you can use
however you choose. Plus when you’re in the members area you get to brand e-books and
include your affiliate links so you can make money when you give away these traffic
builders. Now that’s a cool deal. Push Button Publishing has been very good to me and
it can be good to you as well. ☺Check it out!
Free Chapters from Your Books and e-books
Now you don’t have to give away a whole e-book to get people to sign up for your
newsletter. You can take an excerpt from your book or take a chapter from your e-book and
make it a “special report.” And of course this is a great way to get a casual reader to check
out the material in your book. You can have them access the information either by
downloading the sample, viewing it in a separate web page, or filling out a request to have
the information sent to them. Yet another strategy the pros love to use.
Special Reports
Along the same vein of e-books and excerpts is special reports. I know I just talked about
taking a chapter out of your e-book and calling it a special report, but I wanted to highlight
this awesome viral technique just in case you skimmed through the above paragraph. What
I like about special reports is that you can quickly put them together, include some affiliate
links in the report and then convert the report into a PDF file.
Turbocharging the Pass Along Factor with Viral PDF
Now you have a great little report that you quickly created, but there a trick to making your
report a viral marketing machine. There is a branding tool that you can use to allow people
to insert their affiliate links into your report. Why would you want to let people change your
affiliate links? Easy, GREED. People are going to pass your special report around like
wildfire if they can swap out the affiliate links, insert their own and make money just by
passing the report along.
Don’t worry, you’ll be still making money. Just make sure to include a few references to
your own products, links to your sites and your contact information. Now when that person
changes the affiliate link for YOUR product and someone clicks on the link and buys the
product, you get a sale that you never would have received without the special report.
So how do you do it? There are a number of software programs out there that you can use,
but the best I’ve seen is Viral PDF. Just pick up the software and you’ll be able to ship
your report to potential affiliates along with the branding tool which allows them to
customize the report to include their affiliate links. Once you create the report and have the
tool, you just place the files into a WinZip file, put it on your web-site and start spreading
the word about your report.
SUPER TIP – “Want to Make Money with this Report!” Call to Action
Include a link to the WinZip file in your special report so that when one person gets the file
from someone else, they will download your report, brand it and pass it on. Then the next
person goes to your site and downloads the WinZip file and rebrands the file and then
passes it along. And so on and so on.
Give Them Multiple Options to Sign Up
One last piece of advice. Before you go off and create your web-site, make sure that you’ve
thought through as many ways as possible to collect email addresses and build your opt-in
list. Here are some of the ways that we’ve covered so far in this manual:
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•
•
•
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Place a sign-up box on every page of your web-site
Capture email addresses via an exit pop up box
Create a compelling resource box to use with every article you write
Always include subscription information in your email signature
Write and distribute free e-books that include a subscription box in the first 3 pages
of the e-book
Visit competing web-sites and see what other clever ways they’re getting people to
sign up and “borrow with pride”
PRO TOOLS – If you want to build your subscriber list quickly, you can do what a lot of
the pros did when they got started: buy names. The trick is to deal with only reputable
firms and companies ONLY. One such company is LIST BUILDER Pro. They’ve helped
many leading Internet marketers like Terry Dean, Kevin Donlin, Yanik Silver, Joe Vitale,
Ted Ciuba, Robert G. Allen, Bob Gatchel, Tom Antion, Jay Conrad Levinson, and Marlon
Sanders grow their email newsletters with targeted, opt-in subscribers. If this is the route
you’re looking to go in order to GET a BIG List QUICK, check out LIST BUILDER Pro.
Next Steps
So what traffic builders can you quickly and easily create? Don’t wait until the day you
launch your product to think about this important step. Maybe you try creating some
simple special reports using the material in your e-book or product. Maybe you sign up for
a Google Adwords account and run some tiny little ads and test them. Whatever you do,
just do it. Get started and try a little of everything. Once you find what works best for you
and your site (i.e., what converts the best, run the heck out of it!).
Steal This Idea
One last trick or idea that you can use to get tons of subscribers to your list: give something
away for FREE, but charge shipping and handling. Mike Litman began giving away a FREE
CD that he had created called Greatness Held Hostage. It’s a 58 minute work of genius
that’s always in my car’s CD changer. He offers the CD for FREE and all you have to do is
pay the shipping and handling. The shipping and handling is so low it’s practically a FREE
CD and the $600+ of bonuses he throws on top is worth the $6 investment. Now he gets
your email address and physical address so he can keep in touch with you.
I highly recommend you hop on over to Greatness Held Hostage, buy the CD and watch
how Mike follows up with you! I’ve “stolen” a trick or two from Mike by buying the CD and
seeing how he follows up with me.
S
tep ##8
8 –– D
evelop Y
our B
ackend P
roducts
Step
Develop
Your
Backend
Products
This step could have actually been the last step in the process, but I think it’s critical to do it
here. I’ll explain why in a second.
So by now you should already know the importance of filling out your infoproducts funnel
and having backend products, but now you have a choice to make. Should you:
•
Develop your backend products now?
•
Wait until after you launch your first product?
My Decision – Take the Harder Road
99 times out of 100, I tell my coaching clients to just launch their first product and develop
their backend after they’ve got a successful product. This way they can actually finish one
product, go live and make some money, before they start fooling around with products #2
through #5 all at once. This is a recipe for disaster for most people.
Why?
Because they never complete one project because all their energy and time is focused on
thinking of new products, writing a sales letter for product #2, doing an interview for
product #3, and re-writing the introduction to product #1 and so on. They never actually
complete ANY product and soon life gets in the way and they haven’t made a dollar off their
ideas in 6 months. Then they go off in search of promoting some affiliate program or some
other method of making some quick and easy cash.
My day job as a marketing manager requires me to manage multiple projects at once and
make sure that all of them are moving forward and making progress, all the while staying on
track to meet their deadlines. Substitute the word “projects” for “products” and you can see
why I thought I could go off and create multiple products at the same time.
IT WAS NOT EASY DOING IT THE WAY I DID IT by any stretch of the imagination,
but I got it done. And the smart thing is that each and every product I created references
the other products I created and I don’t have to spend months 1 through 5 (zero being the
launch of a product) worrying about creating my backend. I can spend this time not only
recuperating from the demanding schedule of creating so many products at once, but I can
focus my time and efforts on creating traffic builders to my site and promoting my different
products.
Again, I decided to do it the hard way because I wanted to have that second and third
product available in the series for my customers and I wanted it available to them NOW.
Only time will tell if it was a smart decision. But I wanted to make sure that I told you the
truth about how I did it and why I did it, rather than tell you “develop your backend
products AFTER you’ve created your first product and got it up and running.”
I hope that makes sense. But let’s get back to you and developing your backend products.
It’s important for you to have what I call a FAT Funnel or a host of products that you can
sell to your subscriber list. This is called backend marketing and it’s where the majority of
infopreneurs make their money. You start out with a $27 e-book sale and then if the buyer
likes what they read, they want to learn more from you, so you offer them the next product
in the funnel for them to buy. Eventually you can trade them up to a coaching or bootcamp
package. All of the sudden that $27 sale becomes a $3,000 to $5,000 order.
Obviously backend products are highly important to your success as a marketer, so don’t
make it hard on yourself. You can take the lazy way out and just identify a number of
products with affiliate programs that you can promote to your list. Or you could find
products with resale rights, buy the resale rights, then keep 100% of the profits when you
market and sell the product.
So it’s up to you whether you want to develop your backend products right now or hold off
until you’ve promoted your first product for a while. Of course, it doesn’t have to be an all
or nothing choice. You can do both at the same time.
Do Both – Market Your Product and Develop Your Backend
I said earlier that I recommend that my coaching clients develop and promote their first
product before developing their backend. In reality, that’s the advice I give to those that I
think aren’t as committed to making a living out of selling information products. The
majority of my clients receive the advice to develop their backend products while they’re
testing their sales letter and tweaking the selling process (more on this in step #9).
If you run into trouble developing your backend products for whatever reason, see if you
can find some affiliate programs out there that have complementary products with high
affiliate commissions that you can earn from promoting and selling other people’s products.
There’s nothing wrong with doing this…in the short-term. Long-term you’re absolutely
going to want to push and promote your own products so that you can keep 100% of the
profits.
S
tep ##9
9 –– TTesting
esting Y
our S
ite aand
nd G
oing LLIVE!
IVE!
Step
Your
Site
Going
This is going to be one of the shortest steps I write about, but it’s critical. We covered this a
bit earlier when we spoke about polishing your product. I told you that you had to stop
tweaking and editing and making your product perfect and that you just had to go live at
some point to test it out. Well in step #9 you’re actually going to flick that imaginary switch
and go live with your product. Believe it or not, many infopreneurs work so hard to create
their products, write their sales letter and design their site, but they procrastinate about
“going live” and putting their product on the market.
One of my mentors, Mike Litman, received this bit of advice from one his mentors, Joe
Schroeder of MLMBigFish.com. Joe said to Mike a phrase that you should write down on
an index card and paste to your wall. Joe told Mike that the key to success was to just get
started and forget about being perfect. What was the exact phrase? Joe said:
“You don’t have to get it right. You
just got to get it going.”
My friend, this one statement is what got me off my butt and helped me create my first
information product. I realized that I didn’t have to have everything triple-checked before I
could put it up for sale.
You’ve come this far. Don’t sit there at the one yard line waiting to be escorted into the end
zone. Dive in!!!
Your Checklist – Are You Really Ready to Go Live?
So far I’ve taught you 9 of the 11 steps I’m going to cover in this manual:
Step #1 – Find Your Starving Crowd
Step #2 – Ask Them What They Want
Step #2a – QuickStormTM and Test Your Product Ideas (incl. pricing and USP)
Step #3 – Give It To Them
Step #3a – Pick a Sexy Title
Step #3b – Get Your Domain Name and Web-Site Hosting
Step #3c – Create Your System or Solution
Step #3d – Create Your Product (i.e., give it to them!)
Step #3e – Polish Your Product
Step #3f – Get Your Cover and Graphics for Your Killer Web-Site
Step #4 – Create Your Offer
Step #4a – Plan Your Backend
Step #4b – Create Your Bonus Pile On
MOVE UP - Step #12 – Create Your Offer (incl. 9 Words that Will Lead to Millions)
Step #5 – Get Testimonials and Line Up Your Joint Venture Partners
Step #6 – Write Your Killer Sales Letter
Step #7 – Develop Your Web-Site (incl. Exit Pop-Ups and Autoresponders)
Step #7a – Develop Traffic Builders
Step #8 – Develop Your Backend Products (Optional, but Recommended)
Step #9 – Testing Your Site and Going LIVE!
Make sure you go through the above list to see if you’ve missed any steps in the process to
get you to the point where you can start testing your product and your sales page. Do you
have your web-site up? Is your product listed with Clickbank if that’s the route you’ve
chosen? Do you have your bonuses lined up? Do you have a well-written sales letter for
that mini-site of yours? What about killer testimonials? Do you have them?
I could go on and on, but the point is that you need to go through each of the steps listed
above and make sure that you haven’t skipped a step. There’s something to be said about
just getting it going and putting the site up on your server and GOING LIVE!!!
Testing, Tracking and Tweaking
You’ve spent a lot of time working on your web-site and writing your sales letter, so there’s
going to be this initial rush in your mind to spread the word and line up Joint Venture
partners so that you can send out the message about your product to as many people as fast
as possible. But you have to resist the temptation to go out there and announce your
product until you know for sure that your web-site “pulls.” By pulls I mean does it convert
visitors into buyers. How do you find out whether it pulls or not? You test it, that’s how.
The business of marketing on the Internet is a science, not an art. Some people lose sight of
this, but I don’t want you to. In the weeks after you complete your product and your website, you’re going to be looking at two key ratios to see how well your site pulls: Value Per
Visitor and Conversion Ratio.
We’ve already covered how to calculate these two items in Step #4a, so if you want a quick
refresher, just flip back to that mini-step and you’ll be ready to move on in this manual.
Tracking Visits and Clicks
So you know you need to track the number of people coming to your site and how many are
buying, but how do you do it? Well it’s easy to find out how many people are buying your
product because you just log into Clickbank and check out how many people purchased
your e-book. If it’s a physical product that you’re selling, you can simply log into your onestop shop account like the one at 1AutomationWiz and see how many orders you’ve
made.
There are other ways to track your page visits like using free counter scripts and installing
free CGI scripts onto your web pages, but I like the one stop shop approach of
1AutomationWiz. As for tracking visits, most good web hosting providers will give you
these statistics by page and show you when people are coming to your site and where they’re
coming from. This is why I use ThirdSphere Hosting. It gives me a host (no pun
intended) of ways to look at my sites traffic and really monitor where it’s coming from. If
your web hosting doesn’t offer a good stats package, it might be time to go looking for a
better option.
Running and Tracking Your Ads
One of the easiest and cheapest ways to drive traffic to your site and test your sales letter is
to run some ads in other e-zines. The key is to strategically choose the right e-zines to
advertise in and then write some compelling 5 to 6 lines worth of copy. Then put some
money on the table and run the ads and see which ones work best for you.
I don’t want to get ahead of myself, but you can also track the ads that you run by changing
the web page that you reference in the ad. For instance, I could write several ads and each
would list a different URL and send people to say productinfo.htm, productinfo2.htm,
productinfo3.htm and so on. All have the same sales letter, but I can track which one is
getting the most clicks for me; i.e., which ad is getting the best response. Then I can go back
to the ad and see what part of the copy made the difference. With this knowledge I can then
run the best ad in a lot more e-zines.
An easier way to do the above is when you write articles and run them in different e-zines or
post them online for FREE. You can include a different autoresponder in the resource box,
using the same resource box language for each of the autoresponders. Then when one
article (autoresponder) gets more signups than the others, you know that the article (and
not the language in your resource box) made the difference.
Make One Change at a Time
Regardless of which testing and tweaking methods you use (changing your headline, adding
a signup box on your site, including a free giveaway, etc), you should try and change only
ONE aspect of your sales letter and promotions at a time. This will make it easier to figure
out what impact that one change made on your conversion ratio. If you go off and change
six things at once and your sales skyrocket, you’ll never know which variable made the
difference.
So What are Good Conversion Ratios?
Most big name infopreneurs that I’ve talked to are looking for sites that pull in the range of
2% to 5%. A site that pulls 2% is doing really well in this industry. You should work to
tweak your sales letter so that the conversion ratio improves steadily over time. When you
get started and your site goes live and you run a test ad (more on this in a second), don’t get
discouraged if your site is only converting 1% or less of the traffic. View it as a challenge
and read up on web-site conversion tactics. Get some people to critique your site and make
some suggestions for changes and then implement them. Remember, it’s a science, not an
art and you have to work hard at learning what changes to make in order to increase your
conversion ratio.
As you earn your stripes in this business, you’ll learn how to better qualify your traffic and
create compelling, limited time offers with added bonuses of your own that you can use to
increase your conversion rates to 10%, 15% and even 20%...almost every time. The good
news is that once your site begins to convert at a healthy clip, you don’t have to change it
again if you don’t want. Your only objective is to drive as much traffic to the site as possible.
* Recommended Resource *
If you get Push Button Publishing, they have an Instant Ad Tracker that comes FREE
with the product. All you have to do is learn how to add a tracking link to your site or links
(should take a couple of minutes) and then you’re good to go!
Importance of Knowing Your Value Per Visitor (VPV)
And to close out this discussion, let’s cover an important item. You need to know your value
per visitor because if you don’t, you’ll never know the maximum that you can spend to send
traffic to your site. This fact was hammered home by Armand Morin in a dinner
conversation we had one day. He said that if he was making $5.00 per visitor, he’d spend
$4.99 to drive people to the site. Why? Because he’d still be making money from the traffic.
The point is that once you know how your site converts and how much money you make per
visitor, you can immediately know how much you can afford to spend getting visitors to
your site. So if you’re using a listbuilding service and your site’s VPV is 20 cents, then you’d
better not spend more than 20 cents to drive traffic to your site. I hope that makes sense.
Google Adwords
One of the quickest and easiest ways to test your site is to open an account at
www.Google.com under their AdWords program and choose a couple of keywords that your
product competes in and pay to drive some traffic to your site. I’ll cover Google AdWords
and other “pay-per-click” (PPC) campaigns in step #9a, but I wanted to mention it during
this step so that you knew that PPCs were a great way to test your sales letters for little
investment.
To learn more about how to use Google AdWords the right way so you can actually make
money with it, I suggest you check out my friend Perry Marshall’s The Definitive Guide
to Google AdWords. If you visit his site you’ll see all the big names that have nothing but
praise for Perry’s awesome manual, including Jonathan Mizel and Joe Vitale. It’s definitely
worth a look.
Next Steps
So you’ve completed Step #9a and your product is live and ready to be sold. You’ve tweaked
your sales copy, made some minor changes to your autoresponder e-course and your site’s
pulling 2% or more. Now what? How are you going to get the word out about your
product?
What do you mean you don’t know! Just kidding. Let’s talk about Promoting Your Product
right now…
S
tep ##9a
9a –– P
romoting tthe
he P
roduct
Step
Promoting
Product
By this point you should have your product, your web-site and your killer sales letter written
and you’ve gone live. Now what’s left? Why promoting your product of course.
“Without promotion, something terrible happens, NOTHING!”
– P.T. Barnum
Sales and Marketing. They are the two most important functions of major corporations and
they’re the two main areas that you need to focus your efforts on.
You need to focus on Marketing to bring in targeted leads into your business and you need
some selling skills to convert those leads into buyers.
Yes, it’s important to have operations that are world class to create great products and you
need finance and accounting to make sure things run smoothly, etc., etc., etc. But if you
don’t have customers buying the stuff you’re making, your business is DOA.
I’m not about to get into a lengthy discussion about the techniques and closing tactics that
you need to learn, but we will give you a quick primer. When you’re done reading this
section, we highly recommend that you go out and purchase the following two books:
How I Raised Myself from Failure to Success in Selling by Frank Bettger
The Sales Bible: The Ultimate Sales Resource by Jeffrey Gitomer
Both are phenomenal books that will help you understand more about the selling process
and help you become a better salesperson.
In the meantime, let’s get to our primer.
Selling Isn’t Always Fun, but It’s Always Critical
Even the macho sales cowboys will have to admit that selling is a difficult job to have. Okay,
some salespeople absolutely love selling, but they’re probably not working cold leads and
dialing for dollars. They’ve got their network up and running and their customers come to
them instead of the other way around.
Every infopreneur needs to learn how to sell themselves and their products and services or
else they’re not going to be able to sell their products and services to potential clients. It
doesn’t matter if you’ve written the greatest e-book or you’re the best coach out there, if you
can’t sell yourself, you’re going to be making peanuts instead of the big money. This is why
financial author Robert Kiyosaki stresses the importance of learning how to sell in his
books, tapes, CDs, infomercials, and bootcamps.
Some Key Elements to Great Selling
Just some helpful hints on the principles of selling that you need to be aware of. There’s no
need to do a deep dive on this stuff, because once you have the mechanics set up (Great
Sales Page, Followup Email System and Great Emails), you’re 90% there already. But you
should just read through this step and take some notes on things to keep in the back of your
head as you’re designing your sales system.
What are your prospects key needs and or problems to solve? - You need to listen
to your prospect and understand what their key needs are and what their biggest problems
are.
Be a Problem Solver – We spoke about this in the introductory pages of this ebook and
we’re talking about it again. The whole foundation of your infopreneurial empire stands on
your ability to solve people’s problems quickly and effectively. Make sure you’re solving
your prospects problems or you’re not getting the sale.
You need to build a relationship with your prospect – People buy stuff from people
they like and people they trust. You become a person they want to do business with over
time through building a relationship with them and you establish your credibility through
the books you’ve written, your seminars and your web-site. You can do this through
personal contact or through your online newsletter or your books and CD sets, but you must
do this if you’re going to succeed.
You Need to Handle Their Objections – You need to be able to answer all of their
objections and make them understand WHY they must purchase your product or service
NOW, not at some future date.
Ask for the Sale – It’s amazing how many times people will end a call or a meeting with,
“Well if you’re interested, give me a call.” Ask for the sale right then and there. Online you
do this by having a number of “click to download now” or “Buy it Now” links and buttons on
your sales pages.
List Building 101
We briefly touched on listbuilding a few steps ago, but I wanted to go in-depth during this
step because I thought it made more sense in this section. I want you to focus on building
some quality tools before you go off and try to grow a big list and then….
Right, then what? You have nothing to sell to them. This is not to say that you shouldn’t
focus on building your list before you do seminars, it’s just that you shouldn’t make it your
sole goal. I’d like you to take the long-term view and do what’s right for your business.
Okay, explanation time is over. Let’s talk about…
Building Your List
If you build it, they will come.
That might have worked for Kevin Costner in Field of Dreams, but it won’t work for you.
You to need to help spread the word about your site and why people need to rush on over to
it.
The Importance of Your List
There’s a lot of hype out there right now about how much money you can make on the
Internet. The sales pitch usually tells you how you only need to invest a few dollars and a
couple hours of work and presto, you have a sales machine that operates 24 hours a day.
Well guess what? Some of those stories are outright fraud, but some of them are 100
percent true. You CAN make money while you sleep thanks to the power of the Internet.
With your web-site you have a 24-hour salesperson that’s working to handle leads, answer
questions, and put you in touch with hungry customers. And how do you begin to capitalize
on the hard work, time and money you’ve spent on your web-site? Through the power of
converting your list of subscribers to your newsletter into paying customers, that’s how.
How profitable can it be? Well the most famous example is the one that Hall of Fame
Infopreneur Robert Allen of No Money Down Fame talks about in his book The One
Minute Millionaire.
On May 24, 2000, he sent out an offer to his list of subscribers that had about 11,000
subscribers. Robert told them he was trying to make $24,000 in 24 hours and for their help
in getting there (by buying his seminar), he would load up the wagon with a few hundred
dollars worth of bonuses. 24 hours later he had made over $90,000 from his one little
email.
Not bad huh, but I know infopreneurs that are doing this every day of the week. The key is
getting that casual visitor or surfer into your sales funnel and you do this by
capturing their email address. Then you build your credibility with them through
frequent follow-up via an autoresponder that distributes your newsletter or messages to
your database of opt-in subscribers. This allows you to turn the subscriber who never
bought anything but signed up for your newsletter into a paying customer. And that
customer has the ability to turn into a very highly profitable member or your Internet
community.
Lifetime Value of a Customer
In short, you’re not there just to sell one little rinky dink e-book to someone. You’re there to
provide them with solutions to their problems and offer them your other e-books, your tape
sets, your videos, your seminars, and your one-on-one coaching to name a few items in your
arsenal. Over the course of their lifetime, that one customer that bought a $47 e-book has
now blossomed into a raving fan that has improved their life and their business as a direct
result of the information you have provided them with. In the process they’ve also spent
several thousand dollars with you.
This is the process that I’ve seen work for countless others and now it’s time to work for
you. A few paragraphs ago I talked about the importance of your list and now you know
why it’s so important to build your list. You have the ability to attract subscribers to your
opt-in list and make them into paying customers. These paying customers are going to
create a lifetime of passive income streams into your bank accounts each month. Now that’s
truly the way to make money while you sleep!
It’s Not the Size of the List that Counts (Seriously)
Don’t look for the easy way out when it comes to building your list. A big list is nice and
you’ll get there some day, but it’s not critical to making a lot of money online. I’m serious.
Here me out and then decide for yourself.
Many people rush out and they buy an e-book or two on how to build a list or they pay
thousands of dollars to a list building service only to find that the people on their list aren’t
buying anything from them or worse yet, they could care less about what you have to say.
That’s because you haven’t worked to develop a relationship with them before you try to sell
them. They don’t trust you and they have no reason to believe what you’re saying. To them
you’re just a glorified salesperson: the kiss of death for the would-be expert. So focus on
connecting with your subscribers and overdelivering on your promises.
I struggled to learn how to build my list and I spent thousands of dollars on mailing
lists and other promotions that didn’t pan out. Then I struck gold and learned how
to build my list in the fastest, most efficient, and most cost-effective manner possible;
primarily through publishing articles on the Internet and posting in high-profile web-sites
and doing some joint venture deals. I really think it’s more important for the beginning
marketer to build a RELATIONSHIP with their e-zine subscribers BEFORE they start trying
to market and sell stuff to them. You’ll develop a relationship based on trust and that will
go a long, long way.
PRO TOOLS – Or if you want to build your list quickly, you can do what a lot of the pros
did when they got started: buy names. The trick is to deal with only reputable firms and
companies ONLY. One such company is LIST BUILDER Pro. They’ve helped many
leading Internet marketers like Terry Dean, Kevin Donlin, Yanik Silver, Joe Vitale, Ted
Ciuba, Robert G. Allen, Bob Gatchel, Tom Antion, Jay Conrad Levinson, and Marlon
Sanders grow their email newsletters with targeted, opt-in subscribers. If this is the route
you’re looking to go in order to GET a BIG List QUICK, check out LIST BUILDER Pro.
Hit them Hard and Often
Frequency of your message is important. It’s been said that you need to hit your target with
your message at least 7 to 9 times before they listen and respond to you (hopefully in a
positive manner)!
“Big shots are only little shots who keep shooting.”
- Christopher Morley, Novelist, Journalist, Poet
You have to get the message out to them and the good news about niche marketing and
establishing yourself as an expert in a highly focused market, you don’t have to waste
thousands of dollars.
The easiest way to automate your contact with your subscribers is through the use of a
series or carefully scripted messages. Those messages are delivered via an autoresponder.
You write the messages once, enter them into a sequential series in your autoresponder and
then you just put the whole thing on autopilot. We’ve already covered autoresponders in
this manual, so you should be well acquainted with how they work.
PPC Campaigns
Pay-Per Click (PPC) programs have burst onto the scene in the past year or so. They’ve
taken over for the need to purchase massive number of lists of email addresses for one
simple reason: they work. When you place an ad for your product using keywords and
someone clicks on your ad, you’re getting very, very targeted traffic. That translates into a
better prospect to sign up for your newsletter and more importantly, buy your products. If
you don’t have a PPC campaign or ten running, then you’re really not serious about selling
e-books and making some SERIOUS MONEY ONLINE!
I’m just testing my own PPC programs for the first time this year, so I’m far from a pro at it
right now, but you MUST get up to speed quickly on this valuable tool. I turn to my friends
over at www.SelfPromotion.com for some help with PPCs. They’ll take you through the
basics. Enjoy!
How to Pay for Clicks and Not Pay Too Much!
By Robert Woodhead
While many users will be satisfied with getting free clickthroughs from the search engines, for some
people (myself included), it pays to pay for traffic. There are many sources of paid traffic on the
internet, including banner ads, newsletter sponsorships, and so on, but this article is devoted to three
of the most "search-engine"ish sources, Google Adwords Select, Overture (formerly Goto.com) and
(until recently) RealNames. I also comment on the new DirectHit sponsored listings and the many
Overture clones - and the latest and potentially most revolutionary entry into this arena, Sponsored
Links on Yahoo.
Overture
Overture.com (formerly Goto.com) is simply a search engine where you can bid for the top positions
for various search keywords. It cuts through all the "search engine position" baloney, and simply
says "put your money where your mouth is."
The big news recently with Overture is their partnership with Yahoo which puts the top 3 Overture
results for a keyword near the top of the page in Yahoo search results (positions 4&5 appear at the
bottom of the page, and lower positions sometimes appear on subsequent pages). This will no doubt
increase the traffic you get from them, but the usual positioning rules (see below) still apply.
Overture was originally the best deal on the net for paid clicks, but changes implemented by
Overture have significantly reduced their value, and you now have to be much more selective
in your use of their service.
Overture now charges a setup fee of $50 (applied against your charges, so you get it back),
a minimum monthly fee of $20, and a minimum bid amount of 0.10 per click. Overture has
developed a pattern of increasing their minimum bid amount.
I personally have no problems with the minimum monthly fee; if you're not spending more
than $20 on Overture, you're probably not using it to your best advantage. It's the minimum
bid that I find very shortsighted. I bid on hundreds of terms on Overture, and many of them
are not worth 10 cents. In particular, there are several very general, very high-traffic search
terms that generate a lot of clicks for me, even though my bid is only a cent or two, and even
though my bid position is very low (in the 15-20 range). 20-25% of my Overture bill every
month is a result of those bids.
Overture's major search engine partners only show the top 2 or 3 listings from Overture, so
my low bids will never appear on them -- only on the main Overture site. Under the new
policy, I'd have to remove all of those high-traffic, low-cost search term bids (current
accounts are grandfathered, but the latest increase raises even the old bids to at least 5
cents). That's a total loss of income to Overture - even a penny or two is better than nothing.
If Overture is raising the minimum bid in order to satisfy their partners -- which I have nothing
against, by the way, because any search term for which I'd want to be in the top 5 bids is
going to be worth more than a few pennies -- then the correct way to do it is to simply require
that the top 3 or 5 bids must be 10 cents or more. That way the partners get their money, the
advertisers can still place low-cost, low-position bids on popular keywords, and Overture
optimizes their income. But currently, Overture isn't doing this, so my advice on how to use
them has to be based on their current rate structure, which is getting more and more
advertiser unfriendly as time goes on.
Overall, I find Overture to be reasonably effective. For every $1 I spent with them, I typically got $3 in
contributions from new users. Under their new pricing system (in particular as revised in the spring of
2003), I don't expect it to be that good, but still worthwhile. In the early days, before there was much
competition for keywords, it was more like 10-15:1! Compared to banner ads, Overture tends to
deliver much more targeted and valuable clickthroughs.
That said, given the recent rate changes, as well as the $20 a month minimum, I cannot advise that
you being your experience with pay-per-click at Overture. My advice is that your first stop should be
at Google Adwords (see bottom of the page for more). You'll spend less money, and be able to get a
better (and cheaper) education in what works for you. If Google Adwords makes you money, then
consider getting an Overture account.
Overture now has several Full Service Plans designed to help you get started. $99 or $199
gets you $50 worth of clicks, plus some hand-holding (the more you pay, the more you get)
to help you determine what keywords to target. Of course, if you've read my page about
keyword selection, you can save yourself $49.00 to $149.00. Send half to me (grin)!
How to use Overture
Rule #0: 3-4 word keywords attract buyers, 1-2 word keywords attract browsers. As much as
possible, you want to target and bid on specific phrases. The more specific the phrase, the more
likely it is that a click will convert into a sale. As I love to say, "It isn't the number of clicks you get, but
the number of sales you make!", and this is particularly true when you're paying by the click.
I should give credit where credit is due: I came across this insight during my regular perusal of
WebMasterWorld. It's a must-read if you're serious about web promotion.
Rule #1: don't be obsessed with getting the number 1 position on the search returns. It often
isn't worth it. My rule of thumb is that the more specific the keyword, the higher I want to rank. For
very specific keywords I want to be in the top 3, because then I'll appear in Overture partner sites like
Yahoo. But for general, nonspecific keywords, I believe that positions 8-10 are more cost effective,
because the first few listings will tend to "filter" the clickthroughs you get. After all, the more other
listings the visitor passes up before getting to yours and then clicking on it, the more likely he is
going to be interested in what your site is about. See rules #3 and #4 for amplifications on this.
Rule #2: monitor the effectiveness of your clickthroughs. You can have each of your search
terms click through to a different URL if you want, and you can use this to track what search terms
are actually generating income for you. Some search terms are worth only a few pennies, others
might generate a dollar or more in income per click. Bid accordingly. Overture has a basic tutorial
that demonstrates a couple of ways of making it easier to track the results of your search terms.
Under the new pricing system, it is imperative that you only bid on search terms that are
specifically focused on your product or service. The more specific the keyword, the better it
is likely to convert into a sale. Since you now have to pay at least 0.10 for a click, it is usually
no longer worthwhile sponsoring general keywords. Do the research to figure out what
specific search terms apply to you (read my preparing your pages for the search engines
article for tips on how to do this; in particular, use the www.WordTracker.com service).
If you're a current Overture user who is grandfathered, plan now on what search terms you'll
cancel when those terms start costing you 5 cents. Typically, you'll be getting rid of the lowcost, low-position, high-volume bids, but the only way to know for sure which bids are cost
effective for you is to track your conversion results for each search term you're bidding on. If
you're not doing this now, you should be.
Rule #3: If you are bidding on a keyword that isn't the prime focus of your site, my advice is,
at first, simply bid enough to get on the first page of search returns. Later, once you know how
much those clickthroughs are worth, you can raise your bid to get more clickthroughs, but note that
often, the higher up on the page your link appears, the less valuable it becomes (because of the filter
effect). Now that you have to pay at least 10 cents, you have to be much more picky about even
thinking of sponsoring a general keyword!
For example, if you search for "yahoo" on Overture, you'll find that I have a link to my Yahoo
tips page. I used to be bidding enough to get position 3, but found that dropping my bid to a
mere 2 cents (position 6 at the time, now often not appearing since Overture's stopped
showing the low bids) only slightly reduced the number of clickthroughs but increased the
number of visitors who ended up being contributors - the filter effect in action. Even so,
before the first round of price rises, I was considering dropping my bid to 1 cent, because the
keyword isn't closely focused on what my site does, so my conversion rate from visitors to
paying customers is much lower on this keyword than, for example, "register website." When
Overture forces me to pay a nickel for this term, I'll not be bidding on it and Overture
will be kissing $20 a month good-bye.
Rule #4: Consider bidding for one of the first 3 positions, but only on very specific, very
focused search terms that are directly relevant to your site, but only if they are cheap.
Overture is now providing paid search listings for Yahoo!, America Online, Netscape Search, Lycos,
Hotbot and Altavista - but only the top listings will appear. Overture search results also appear on
many of the major metasearch sites.
This promises to generate a large amount of traffic, but because each of these sites differs in how
many Overture listings they display on their first page of results, the "let the top positions act as a
filter" advice may not be the best approach because it means you won't appear on the other search
engines, many of which get a LOT more traffic than the main Overture site.
My gut feeling here is that if you're currently in the #4-6 position for a very specific search term on
Overture, and you can bump yourself to position 3 for less than a 25-30% jump in your bid, it's
probably worth doing. But here's an important caveat; if you get outbid and drop to position 4, then
you probably should reduce your bid to put yourself back into the position 6-8 range. Similarly, if you
can get a #2 position cheaply, go for it.
Obviously, you should only do this on search terms that will only be searched for by people who are
clearly interested in what you're offering, and like any other search term, you need to monitor how
cost effective it is. You can't lose a penny on every click and hope to make it up on the volume!
Because the new search engines have much more traffic than Overture, less popular variants (and
misspellings) of your keywords will become more important. Consider increasing the number of
keywords you sponsor to cover the misspellings.
Wrapping it up
The whole point with pay-per-click is this: if the average visitor to your site generates 20 cents of
profit for you (after counting all your costs!), and you can get the visitor for less than 20 cents, then
you make money. So it's crucial that you be able to track your visitors and determine how much they
are worth to you. For example, I know that the average visitor sent to me from Overture is worth 18
cents. My average cost per click is around 6 cents, so I'm making a nice profit on the investment.
The new pricing system means you have to be more careful and monitor your clickthrough
conversions more closely.
Other Overture-like services
There are tons of new services that use the Overture model; in order of traffic they generate, the
most popular are FindWhat, Sprinks (sponsored links on About.com), Kanoodle, and Xuppa
(formerly Bay9). None of them generate more than a small fraction of the traffic that Overture will, but
FindWhat is probably worth looking at; it generates 10 times as much traffic as Kanoodle or Xuppa
and has been agressively ramping up traffic recently. If you are spending $50 a month or more with
Overture, FindWhat may be worth doing as well (they charge a $25 setup fee). Wondering why some
of the sites don't have links? Read on!
Keep in mind that you need to track traffic from each of these search engines seperately, because
the "quality" of their clicks varies. While the average visitor from Overture is worth 16 cents to me,
the average FindWhat visitor generates only about 10.5 cents in income. Thus my bids on FindWhat
are considerably lower than my equivalent Overture bids. Here are the current overall statistics on
clickthroughs I've gotten from some of the major pay-per-click engines; as you can plainly see, the
quality of some of them is abysmal and they should be avoided. At the present time, I can't
recommend bids of more than 1 cent on any pay-per-click engines other than Overture and
FindWhat -- and on Xuppa and NetFlip, I can't even recommend that! Espotting is a special case,
they are a UK-based pay-per-click engine with relatively low traffic but decent results; you might
consider them if your business is international in scope. Espotting is affiliated with Xuppa but
generates much better results.
Whatever you do, avoid any pay-per-click service that pays surfers to click. The quality of the clicks
is very low, and clickfraud is rampant.
Site
Overture
FindWhat
Espotting
Epilot (*)
Kanoodle
Sprinks
Xuppa (Bay9)
NetFlip
% of clicks
% that send me
that create
a contribution
account
11.36%
0.89%
8.66%
0.61%
11.62%
0.44%
6.66%
?
4.25%
0.20%
8.71%
0.24%
2.18%
0.06%
0.50%
?
Average click
value
(in cents)
16.85
10.68
9.45
?
4.05
3.92
0.63
?
Note: While Epilot is generating decent account conversion rates, the traffic from this engine is so
low (about 1 click a day) that after 2 months of sponsored listings, it is impossible to determine a
conversion ratio.
Finally, some of these services have problems with click-fraud; people running robots to repeatedly
click on links so as to drain your account. I have never had a problem with Overture in this regard,
they seem to be very on the ball, but I have had some problems with some of the others. If you
notice something and complain, you can almost always get a refund, but you have to notice, so keep
careful logs of your clickthroughs from these services and scan them for suspicious activity (repeated
clicks on the same link, repeated clicks from the same IP address, etc).
In particular, I cannot recommend Kanoodle. I just got hit with a blatant and obvious case of
clickfraud, which drained my account of over $40.00 right after I added more money to it. What is
particularly interesting about this case is that it was so blatant and obvious that even the most
cursory anti-fraud detection on the part of Kanoodle should have caught it, so clearly they don't have
any such thing installed. The fraud was on a keyword where I had a 1 cent bid and was in a low
position! A deeply troubling event, compounded by the fact that Kanoodle took over a week to
respond to my inquiry about this event, and then came back with a boilerplate reply that did not
address the questions I posed. Other longtime selfpromotion.com users have had problems with
Kanoodle.
Google's Adword Select
Adwords Select is Google's entry into the pay-per-click arena, but it is so different -- and unique -that it deserves a section all on its own.
Adwords Select listings are small text ads that appear to the right of the main Google listings. Google
makes it very clear these are advertisments.
Like other pay-per-click engines Google lets you decide how much you want to pay for a click.
However, Google doesn't rank sites by how much they are willing to pay! Instead, they rank them by
how much money they generate for Google!
Lets say you have an ad that generates a 2% Clickthrough Ratio (CTR). This means every time
Google shows your ad 100 times, on average, 2 clicks result. And suppose you're willing to pay 50
cents for each click. The result is that, on average, Google earns 1 cent per showing (100 showings
= 2 clicks = 100 cents of income).
Your competitor, on the other hand, is willing to pay 75 cents for a click. However, his ad only
generates a 1% CTR, so if Google shows his ad 100 times, he'll get 1 click and Google gets 75
cents.
In Google's system, even though you are bidding less than your competitor, your ad will appear in a
higher position, because it generates more money for Google. Even better, Google will automatically
adjust the amount you pay down to the minimum amount needed to maintain your position.
This means that Google's system rewards those advertisers who can write good ad copy that
attracts clicks, and that sponsor relevant keywords. In fact, if your CTR on a keyword drops below
0.5%, Google stops showing your ad. The whole system is very slick, and very much in the Google
tradition of doing things very differently from the rest of the search engines.
Oh, and did I mention that Google charges a piddling $5.00 to open an account, and only charges
you for your clicks after you get them? Such a deal.
As of the current writing (3/1/2003), I've been using Adwords for about a year, and my results have
been modest but positive. It isn't the screaming bargain that Overture used to be (and alas, no longer
is!), but it's making money for me. Also, I very much like the way the advertiser interface helps you
optimize keywords and ad copy. If you're just starting out in pay-per-click, I'd use it to get my feet
wet, and then, if you do well, use the knowledge gained from Google Adwords to effectively use
Overture. And if you're already advertising on Overture, you should strongly consider giving them a
try.
Andrew Goodman has written an excellent report on Adwords that raises some interesting points. It
costs $49 but if you are a serious pay-per-click advertiser, it is probably worth the investment. You
can find out more about it here. As always, commissions I receive on referrals are donated to charity.
RealNames
At first I had good things to say about RealNames. Then, as they changed their policies, I had bad
things to say about them. But now I have nothing to say, because as of May 2002, they're going out
of business.
DirectHit
DirectHit, which supplies search engine results to a lot of indexes and search engines, now has
sponsored listings. However, unlike Overture, you bid on a "cost per thousand impressions" basis,
with a minimum bid of $5.00 per thousand. So you pay every time your listing is shown to a visitor,
not every time one clicks through to you.
My experience with DirectHit has been totally dismal and I do not recommend them at all. The
average cost per clickthrough was about $1.00, 20 times the cost of a Overture clickthrough. Avoid
them.
Yahoo Sponsored Listings
Yahoo has just started offering Sponsored Listings for between $25 to $300 a month, depending
on category. 5 sponsored listings are displayed at the top of category pages (if more than 5 people
buy sponsored listings, they rotate randomly). In order to get a sponsored listing, you must first get a
normal listing in Yahoo, then you can apply for a sponsored listing in the category your listing is in.
You can't use this to change your listing title or description, by the way; it just gets you "up top."
Is it worth it? My experience is that Yahoo Sponsored Listings totally suck! Not only are the
clickthroughs dismal, but when I applied for a sponsored listing, Yahoo edited my current Yahoo
listing and totally trashed it. Talk about adding insult to injury! Even worse, I have been trying to get a
response from Yahoo on this, and so far, they haven't responded, even to my requests to cancel my
sponsored listing.
Yahoo has also introduced "Most Popular" listings underneath the sponsored listings; so far it is
unclear how a site becomes a Most Popular site.
Related Sites:
Overture has several PPC-related tools that are useful for finding the right keywords to bid on (and
not just on Overture, research done there can broadly be used on other PPC engines).
PayPerClickSearchEngines.com is a good site that is full of information and links related to payper-click search engines.
Similarly, PayPerClickAnalyst.com is a well organized site, full of useful reviews of the various paypay-click sites.
CompareYourClicks.com is a nifty site that lets you see, in real-time, what it will cost to bid for
particular keywords on a number of the major pay-per-click search engines.
===========================================================
Robert Woodhead, CEO, AnimEigo www.animeigo.com
www.selfpromotion.com The Net's only URL registration SHARESERVICE.
A power tool for power webmasters.
===========================================================
That was a pretty thorough look at pay-per-click campaigns. Why did I include them?
Because I think and know they’re the next big thing in list-building and advertising for your
budding business.
Perry Marshall’s Google Adwords
If you want to know more about the biggest player in the game right now, Google AdWords,
then you’re going to want to check out my friend Perry Marshall’s The Definitive Guide
to Google Adwords. I met Perry at a recent seminar and he really knows his stuff. He
cuts through the hype and gives it to you straight. As I mentioned earlier, this is worth the
investment!
Discussion Forums, Ezines and Beyond
I’ve covered newsletters, e-zines, and online forums earlier in this e-book, so I won’t go into
great detail here. These three promotional vehicles, two if you only have an e-zine and not a
printed newsletter, are going to be the bread and butter promotional vehicles for beginners.
My suggestion is to learn by watching what others do, what kind of offers they put in their
newsletters, and how they post messages in online forums. You can learn a lot by watching
the best of the best do what they do, then imitating what they’re doing.
Ezine Advertising
Advertising in other e-zines can be a cost-effective way of testing your sales copy and
driving traffic to your web-site. Make sure you run your ads in quality e-zines. The last
thing you want to do is spend money to advertise in an e-zine that’s full of 25 to 50 ads
because yours will get lost and you’ll have wasted your money.
The cost of the ad and the size of it will depend on the circulation of the e-zine (total
number of subscribers) and the type of ad you’re running. The more people that belong to
the e-zine, the more you’re going to have to pay, especially if the owner is an established
player. There are three main types of ads Sponsor Ads, Solo Ads and Free Classified Ads.
Free Classified ads are usually given as bonuses by list owners when you join their email
list. Don’t discount these ads and make sure you send the list owner your free ad for them
to run.
Sponsor ads are those little 5 or 6 line ads that you see in e-zines. You can have sponsor
ads in the top, middle or the bottom of an e-zine. Obviously the top part of a newsletter or
issue will get read more often than the bottom portion, so top spot ads are better and a little
more expensive.
Solo ads are where you send out an ad to the list owners’ subscribers and you’re the only
ad in the mailing. Your ad copy is going to be a lot longer than a few puny 5 to 6 lines of
copy, so you should expect the ad to pull better…that is if you learn to write compelling
copy.
So how do you find the e-zines to run your ads in? You can take the hard route, or the easy
route. The hard route is sifting through a Google search. The easy route is to head on over
to a listing of e-zines that are sorted by category. Directory of Ezines will help you find
some of the best of the best and give you the contact information, ad rates and specs for the
ads of hundred of the best ezines out there. It’s not a free service, but it’s very cheap
compared to the time and effort it will save you.
SELLING TO YOUR LIST
Bounce-Back Catalogs
In the pre-information age, gurus would create a mini-catalog of their products and services
and send it out to their mailing list. That’s right. They had a physical color catalog that they
would print up every year or six months, fire up the label maker and stick labels on the
catalogs and send them out. Most have gotten away from that and you want to know why?
You guessed it, the internet.
Now you can have your catalog up and in front of consumers 24/7. You just upload the
product information onto your web-site, get a shopping cart for your site and you’re open
for business every day, 24 hours a day.
But that’s just one way to do it. The more profitable way is to use autoresponders and
messages sent in a specific sequence to get your subscribers and freebie seekers and turn
them into buyers.
The process is so simple that all you have to do is create some copy once (or swipe it from
some internet guru you admire and tweak it), load up your autoresponder with 4 to 15 or
more messages and you’re done. You just have to monitor your autoresponder and maybe
tweak your messages once in a while.
Oh, you have to also check your bank account every month to see how much money you’ve
made or go to your mailbox to collect the checks. Fun isn’t the word to describe this
monthly routine. You’re going to be freaking ecstatic every month when the checks
come….all because you took one weekend and locked yourself in a room, wrote a bunch of
emails and offers, and uploaded them to your autoresponder.
MANY, MANY MORE TACTICS YOU CAN USE
There are literally thousands of ways that you can sell your products to people. Some of the
better known and successful ways are:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Postcards
Classified Ads in Newspapers
Classified Ads in Magazines
Online Classified Ads
Ezine Advertising
Discussion Forum Posts with your Signature File (not SPAM)
Joint Venture Mailings
Free Teleseminars
And so on. Keep a constant watchout for ways other marketers are selling themselves and
their services. Make it a point to look into one new way to sell yourself every month. If you
learn how to feed your funnel with fresh, new quality leads every month, then you’ll have a
never-ending flow of new customers that you can transform into lifelong customers.
If you want to market with postcards, there’s only one course to get:
Alex Mandossian’s Marketing with Postcards
If you want to learn more about Ezine Advertising check out:
Directory of Ezines
Here’s a great resource to learn more about Joint Ventures:
JV Secrets (Included as a Bonus for Your Purchase of this e-manual)
Want to make money from the comfort of your own home, using only your phone, a digital
recorder and a conference line? Then teleseminars are for you:
Teleseminar Magic
I highly recommend the last one. Of course I wrote it so I’m a little biased. ☺
Giving Away Sample Chapters
I mentioned earlier the subject of exit pop-ups, but I wanted to go into more detail here.
One of the best ways to sell your product is to give away a sample. Marketers have been
doing this for centuries and it’s proven to be one of the most effective sales tactics around.
Why does it work so well? Because when you give someone a taste of your product or you
give them a weeks supply of a product they need to use frequently, they get hooked. They
get hooked on using the product or they like the taste or in the case of your e-book, they like
what they read and they want to read more, they’re going to do what? Exactly. Buy your ebook.
Take the time to research pop-ups and write the headlines and the copy that goes into the
pop-up very carefully. Yes, I want you to study pop-ups and which ones cause you to STOP,
RECONSIDER signing up for the site and/or getting you to BUY something. Get that kind
of copy into your pop-up and everything from your newsletter signups to your sales of your
e-books will skyrocket overnight.
More Traffic
If you’re currently driving 100 people a day to your site and you double it to 200, it should
stand to reason that you’ll have double the sales. You can instantly see why people are so
crazed over driving traffic to their sites.
So what can you do to drive more traffic to your site? One thing you can do is write articles
that get posted online and in other ezines that point people back to your site.
You can run a Pay-Per-Click campaign to drive people to your site using targeted keywords
and it should be obvious, but the more targeted the traffic the better the results you can
expect to have and by results I mean sales!
Alright. Enough talk about driving traffic and getting customers. I want to talk about the
most important piece of the puzzle: YOU!
The Importance of YOU
Creating an online business is simple, but it’s not easy. There are blueprints out there that
you can copy, as you’ll find out by using the one I gave you as a bonus when you bought this
e-book: 33 Days to Online Profits.
But a stupid simple blueprint alone won’t guarantee your success. YOU need to be out there
pushing and promoting your product. YOU’ve got to be there to set up great customer
service and write great articles promoting YOU, YOUR site and YOUR products. YOU have
to go out and get JV partners and YOU have to follow-up with them and YOU have to stay
on top of YOUR webmaster and YOU have to plan YOUR backend and YOU have to …..
YOU get the point. When YOU create an information product and YOU want to make big
money from it, then YOU have to do a lot of work. Now don’t get me wrong, if YOU’re
happy with selling 3 or 4 copies of YOUR e-book every month, then move on and forget this
step.
But if YOU want to sell a boatload of products, take the time to follow-through on YOUR
plan and really, really work it and YOU’ll find YOUrself with a ridiculous amount of money
coming into YOUR bank account every month. If YOU work hard and smart, YOUR success
is practically guaranteed.
Giver’s Get
One last point under the topic of YOU. Some of the biggest names online are the best
givers. By this I mean that they freely accept offers for interviews and use of some of their
reports and e-books as giveaways and so on. Those products they’re giving away will then
find their way into the hands of thousands of other readers who may have never been
exposed to them before…all thanks to their ability to see the benefit of helping someone else
out. And of course additional exposure will lead to additional sales and potentially lifelong
customers for the giving guru.
What a win/win situation!
They understand that if they help someone get started, that person will help promote their
business. The true givers in life don’t even demand that you help them, they just know how
the law of reciprocity works. They help you now and someone, someday and in someway
helps them.
Those that don’t understand this law DEMAND that you promote them and how does that
leave you feeling? No one likes to do something they don’t want to do, so when it comes
your time to give an interview or help someone out, do it with a smile.
S
tep ##9b
9b –– B
uilding Y
our A
rmy ((of
of A
ffiliates)
Step
Building
Your
Army
Affiliates)
Your Own Affiliate Program
Affiliate programs are one of the most important factors in the success of infopreneurs. The
biggest reason is that you only pay an affiliate when they make a sale. You don’t pay them if
they don’t make a sale for you. In other words, YOU CAN’T LOSE!!!
One of the first affiliate programs around was the one established by Amazon.com. Marlon
Sanders derives close to 99% of his sales through affiliates. Yanik Silver gets close to 40% of
his sales through affiliates. And of course there’s Corey Rudl who pretty much was the first
marketer to really catch onto the importance of affiliate programs. He does about $8
million a year through his web-sites and the majority of that money and the traffic to his
web-sites is brought in by affiliates.
Do I have your attention?
I thought so. When I first heard that dollar amount my mouth dropped and then I quickly
said:
“I’ve got to get me one of them there affiliate programs!”
And I hope that’s the reaction you just had as well to what I said above. My objective for the
next few years is to build an army of affiliates that will promote and help me sell my
products. There are two main ways to create your own affiliate program: by purchasing
your own affiliate software or by using a third party company that specializes in affiliate
tracking. I went the later route.
Eventually I may create my own affiliate program through my autoresponder service
(1Automationwiz), but for right now, the easiest way to set up your affiliate program is
through Clickbank. Clickbank currently has over 100,000 affiliates on board, all waiting
to get wind of the latest and greatest products on the market so they can make some money
by promoting them. Any time someone sees your product and realizes that you sell it
through Clickbank they will go ahead and insert their Clickbank link and promote your
product. This is why if you’re going to go the third party route, you’re best off using the
company that has 100,000-plus affiliates on board!
Obviously I didn’t cover everything about affiliate programs because we don’t have too
much time to get into details and you can just look below at the recommended resources
and see a free resource you can use to “bone up on” affiliate programs. One last bit of
advice: Make sure you stay in contact with your affiliates. You want to update them with
new promotional emails they can use, new product announcements and success stories.
Just set up another autoresponder and make sure all of your affiliate join the list.
Affiliate Tracking Software
There are a number of options beyond just Clickbank. For instance, Corey Rudl has a
great affiliate tracking software program that a number of heavyweights in the industry use.
It’s called AssocTRAC and well, Corey’s got over 50,000 affiliates so AsocTRAC can handle
the load.
Another option as I mentioned is to use a “one stop shop” type service like
1Automationwiz which will give you affiliate tracking software, unlimited autoresponders
and a shopping cart to name a few things. It’s a great resource.
Spreading the Word
If you’re looking to grow the number of affiliates that you have very, very quickly, you can
use a paid service like www.Affiliate-Announce.com. Personally I recommend going
slow and testing to make sure that your selling process is all buttoned up before bringing on
too many affiliates, but it’s up to you to decide how big and how fast you go.
For More Information
Just head on over to www.AssociatePrograms.com to find out more about how to do
affiliate marketing the right way! You’ll find a listing of the top affiliate marketing
programs out there and you should definitely join them to figure out how the pros and big
names in the business are promoting their products and services through their affiliate
programs.
Super Affiliates
If you have enough high-producing “super” affiliates on board, you can quickly and easily
sell thousands of units of your product. The easiest way to recruit affiliates is by turning
your existing customers into affiliates. After all, your customers who have read or used your
product are the best advocates for your product. They’ve profited and benefited from its use
and are probably raving fans and want to spread the word about you, your service and/or
your product.
You can recruit your customers (and others) through reminding your newsletter subscribers
that you have an easy-to-use affiliate program that pays 50% of the net sale as a
commission. By the way, 50% is the going rate for low-ticket items. After you get above
$97, most infopreneurs play a flat rate per referring customer who actually buys the
product.
WARNING: Remember what I said about making sure your site converts before reaching
out to the big boys and girls in affiliate marketing. You don’t want to get a super affiliate on
board and have them promote your product and your site not convert enough people to
make it worth their while. Test, track and tweak your site to optimize it first, then when it
starts converting, start lining up your joint venture partners.
Once you start to build your list of affiliates, you will see the tremendous power affiliate
marketing can have on your sales.
S
tep ##9c
9c –– M
aking B
ackend S
al es
Step
Making
Backend
Sales
Of course once you make that first sale, your selling isn’t done. Remember when you
worked so hard to fill out your infoproducts funnel and worked hard to develop those
backend products? Well, it’s time to sell those products to your new customers. I’m not
going to get into the steps it takes to make those products, because you already know them:
just go through steps #1 through #3.
Just to refresh your memory, backend marketing or sales is when you sell another product
or service to your new customer, hopefully a product with a higher price tag. Mastering this
step will quickly skyrocket your income. Let me give you an example to explain how it
works and hopefully you’ll realize why you should focus hard on learning the art of backend
marketing.
Let’s say you sell your e-book for $37 to 100 people in 30 days. You’ve just earned $3,700
gross. We won’t get into splitting commissions with affiliates and paying for transaction
fees in this example. Now you get every buyer to sign up for a free e-course that you provide
on a subject that’s closely tied into your e-book. In each of the emails that go out you
include a little 5 to 7 line advertorial for one of your other products, say a $99 CD set that’s
a recording of a $1,500 seminar you conducted.
That’s tremendous value to your customers, so a number of them jump on the offer. Let’s
say you get 1 out of every 5 to buy, which means 20 people click through the link you
provided and buy your CDs. Now you’ve made an extra $1,980 just by including a few lines
about your product in an email that you set up a long time ago in an autoresponder.
Without your backend profit, you would have earned $123 a day ($3,700 / 30 days) from
your e-books. Not a bad take since you worked hard for a few days and got the product up
and running on autopilot. But because you went the extra mile and created some backend
products, you’re making $189 a day ($3700 + $1980 / 30 days). You’ve just increased your
profits per day by over 53% because you have a backend profit!
There are a number of marketers out there who lose money or break even on their initial
sale to customers because of the high costs of acquiring a customer. These marketers bank
on making money on the backend. The ideal situation is to make money on the
front end and the backend.
Instant Backend Products
A quick and easy way to get a hold of backend products is to join several affiliate programs.
Make sure you join ones that have products that are tied in closely to your products. You
want to make sure that you’re promoting products that your customers are going to be
looking for. If you’re selling an information product on making more money from your
investments, it makes no sense to be pushing an e-book on how to lose ten pounds fast!
Does that make sense? I hope so. Now let’s talk about when you’re going to be marketing
your backend products to your customers. There are 5 simple times or ways that you can
market your backend products to your customers and site visitors.
5 Times or Ways to Market Your Backend Products
#1 - Immediately
Remember when we spoke about upselling and how savvy marketers offer their buyers
another product or service right when the prospect has pulled out their credit card and
they’re at the checkout page? Well this is the first place that you’re going to try and sell your
prospect/buyer another product. They’ve already raised their hand and said “I like what
you have to offer and I want to buy it,” so why not offer them another product, right?
The process is very simple and can be done in one of two ways: make the product offer on
the checkout page or the confirmation page. When you make it on the confirmation page,
you just put something like “Wait! Because you’ve chosen to buy [insert name of product]
today, you’re entitled to a 40% discount of [insert name of upsell product]. Buy it today and
I’ll even through in [insert name of special report] as an added bonus.” You’ll get anywhere
from 20% to 30% of buyers to go for the additional product.
The other way to do it is when the buyer has entered their credit card info and clicked the
confirmation button. They’ll go to your “Thank You” page and you’ll place your offer on this
page. This method isn’t as effective as doing it on the initial order or interim page. I’ve
asked around and it seems to pull or convert 10% to 20% of buyers. Not bad, but I prefer
upselling people immediately on the order page.
For more advice and a great example of a master at the upsell, check out Yanik Silver’s sales
page for Instant Sales Letters. Just click on the “Buy Me” link and you’ll be taken to the
upsell page.
#2 - When You Deliver the Product
Most electronic products you will sell will be downloaded from a web page that you set up.
The buyers find the page thanks to an email that’s loaded into your product delivery
software. Maybe you offer them in the email or on the download page the chance to buy the
resale rights to the product. Speaking of the download page, this is yet another place where
you can include an ad for an additional product or service that you offer. This method isn’t
as successful at converting buyers to buy more stuff, but it’s worth the extra set up time to
create the links and ads for your products.
#3 – Days After the Sale
Not every customer is going to go for the immediate upsell or buy another product when
they’re downloading the product. They want to test out the first product before they fork
over their hard-earned money for more stuff that you’re offering. No problem. Hopefully
you’ve done a good job of making sure you’ve captured their email address so you can
follow-up with them and build a relationship.
Remember, you can get their email addresses in a number of ways:
" Include a subscription box on the download page
" Include a link to your main web-site in your confirmation email
" Ask them for it in the first few pages of your e-book (in exchange for a free report, etc.)
As we’ve discussed earlier, you simply set up a series of autoresponder messages that you
send out to them. Maybe it’s a mini e-course or perhaps it’s a free sneak preview of an
upcoming product of yours. In each of the e-mails you include a little ad or blurb about
your other products, with a link to the sales pages. It’s important that you load enough
messages into your autoresponder series because it often takes a number of exposures to a
sales message for a buyer to buy. The number of messages or frequency as it’s called in the
industry is critical because it sometimes takes people hearing the message 9 or 10 times
before they buy, so don’t fall short!
#4 – Free Special Reports or eBooks
Another way to get a soft sell message for another product in front of your customer is to
include a link to an additional bonus in your download page, your e-course or your thank
you message. These “unadvertised” bonuses are very much appreciated by your customer
because they see it as you overdelivering. Now the report can be something like a 20 to 30
page excerpt from another e-book of yours. This will serve to showcase the best pages from
your e-book and get the people wanting to learn more about the product. Of course you will
mention that they can get the full-length version at your web-site. To really sweeten the pot
and get them to buy, offer a discount of 10% to 25% in subsequent emails.
You could also create a short little e-book that you send out to them. Inside the e-book are a
number of mentions and links to your other products. Of course you can include your
affiliate links to other products as well. Yet another way to make more money on the
backend.
#5 – Before You Leave Popup Box
This is slick. When someone comes to your sales page and doesn’t buy something from you
and clicks to leave your site, an exit pop up box appears. Tom Antion uses this on his sites
where he tells people to choose their price and includes a price that’s lower than the one on
the sales page. Other marketers have used the discount method by including a countdown
timer that will expire and the additional bonus or discount will be lost forever. Sometimes
the exit popup will tell them to enter their email address to receive the first two chapters of
the e-book or a free copy of a different e-book (see above for more on the free e-books and
reports you can create).
Obviously there are a lot of ways that you can sell your products on the backend. The best
way to save yourself some time, effort and money is to just learn from the pros. See what
others are doing to get you to buy more stuff from them. Learn how they’re doing it and
apply it to your sales process.
I know I haven’t talked much about your sales process, but it’s critical that you sit down and
walk through the different interactions or touch points with your site’s visitor and your
buyers. You must be clear on when, where and how you’re going to upsell your customers
or how you’re going to reach out to your non-buyers and get them to buy. You need to
monitor how your ads in your e-courses are pulling and determine the different ways that
you can overdeliver value to your list, while getting them to move down into the more
expensive part of your infoproducts funnel.
Think it through. Reach out to other pros for help when you need to, but most of all, don’t
be afraid to tweak with your sales process. A little 1% improvement every week or two could
mean the difference between averaging $100 a day and averaging $500 a day.
S
tep ##10
10 –– M
aintenance M
ode
Step
Maintenance
Mode
((Profiting
Profiting W
hile Y
ou S
leep)
While
You
Sleep)
Minimizing Refunds
I haven’t had much experience in this area yet (knock on wood), but I’ve read up on the
subject and interviewed some other experts to find out what they do to minimize refunds
and returns. Notice I said “minimize” and not “eliminate” because you’re always going to
have a certain percentage of people who aren’t really serious about using their product and
they’re going to want their money back. Just let them have it, no questions asked, and move
on with your life. The last thing you want is some disgruntled customer out there
complaining how you wouldn’t let them have their $27 back!
Don’t Publish Crap! – Remember this statement from before? Well, this really is the
first way that you can work toward minimizing your refunds. When you publish and create
high quality stuff, you cut down on the number of people who demand their money back.
Remember, make them say “HOLY CRAP!” when they see your product because it’s that
amazing and so simple to read or use, digest and profit from!
Build a Relationship – You should strive to build a relationship with each of your
customers. Not that you have to physically write an email to each and every buyer. You can
“personalize” your contact through creating messages with a personal touch and loading
them into your autoresponder. Then you sign up each and every buyer into the message
loop and you’re done. If someone responds to one of your messages or sends you an email,
respond as quickly as you can. This adds a “human element” to their interaction with you.
You should also strive to create relationships with your non-buyers as well. Once you’ve
developed a relationship with a subscriber, it’s not too difficult to convert them into a
paying customer. Once you have them as one of your customer, you just shift gears and
continue to market your other products to them. If they love your products, they’re going to
buy everything you offer.
Unadvertised Bonuses – I talked about this earlier, but it really is a savvy way to cut
down on refunds. Your buyer gets an email with a bonus a few days after they’ve bought
your product and there’s a link to an unadvertised bonus. You tell them that they will be
receiving another 2 to 3 other “unadvertised bonuses” in the next few days as well. They’re
happy and excited and immediately click on the link and get their free bonus. You simply
space out the bonuses and by the 31st day (and after their money back guarantee window
has expired) you send them a link to their last freebie.
Those are just a few of the main ways to minimize refunds, but there are other ways as well.
Hopefully you’re going to create products that underpromise and overdeliver and are so
AMAZING and immediately useful that no one in their right mind will ask for a refund. Of
course you can always let the psychos and freaks get their money back. Who wants them on
their list anyway?
Better Conversion – When you convert more traffic, you get more sales out of the same
traffic. In other words, if you’re able to bump up your conversion rate from 2% to 4%, you’ll
sell 4 units for every 100 visitors instead of 2. That’s HUGE! I know it might not sound like
much, but if you’re able to increase your conversion consistently and you get the number
high enough to around 5% and above, you’re going to be able to get some serious affiliates
interested in promoting your products.
How do you convert more traffic? There are a number of things you can do.
Improve your sales letter – You can either do it yourself by grabbing a copy of Instant
Sales Letters or you can go to www.Elance.com and find a copywriter to retool your copy
so your sales letter pulls better.
Use an Exit Pop-up for Non-Buyers – We’ve talked about it before, but you can insert a
simple little script into your main web page that will trigger a popup window to come up if
someone doesn’t click on the “Buy NOW!” button. You can offer them a free report or minie course. Savvy internet marketers will ask their non-buyers for some feedback. They ask a
question like “Can I ask why you didn’t buy my e-book today?” in exchange for a free report
or valuable gift. Of course now the person’s email address has been captured and they start
to track why people don’t buy and they can tweak their sales letter and pitch to meet these
objections. Smart. Very smart.
"Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning."
-Bill Gates
Respond to Objections – Speaking of objections, it’s important to know why your buyers
are not buying. You can find out using an ethical bribe like the free report we talked about
or you can offer a free chapter or two from your e-book or bonus mp3 download. Whatever
it is, write down their major objections and re-write your copy to address their major
objections. You’ll find that your conversion rate will dramatically improve as a result of
some simple tweaking of your copy.
Better Testimonials – After you’ve been online for a while and have a number of
customers, reach out to them and ask them for a testimonial. If you have to use an ethical
bribe, then do it. Now insert your testimonials with specific results into your sales letter.
You don’t necessarily have to get rid of the old ones, just place them later in your sales letter
or in the middle of a long string of testimonials.
Audio Messages – Another great way to increase your conversion rate is to insert a quick
little audio message to your potential buyer. This little tactic helps to add a “face” to the
jumble of words that follow. You can record a quick message welcoming them, telling them
a little about where you were before you discovered your amazing system, the results you
got and why they MUST buy your product to improve their lives. You can also include audio
testimonials from satisfied clients throughout your sales letter. Yet another way to add
credibility and build trust with your potential buyers. To get your hands on the best system
for adding instant audio to your site and marketing efforts, check out Audio Postcards by
Armand Morin.
S
tep ##11
11 –– D
o IItt A
ll O
ver A
gain ((and
and
Step
Do
All
Over
Again
A
gain aand
nd A
gain)
Again
Again)
You’re Done, Right?
So you’ve got a profitable product and you’re promoting the heck out of it, so you’re done,
right? Not exactly. As the song goes…we’ve only just begun!
The first thing my coach said to me when I asked “What’s next?” after I finished my first
infoproduct was:
“Easy. You Rinse, Lather and Repeat!
And do it as often as possible!”
You have to repeat the entire process over and over again if you want to make any real
money from selling information products. Look at any of the big names in the information
selling business and you’ll see that they have a whole line-up of products that they have to
offer to their satisfied customers. Strive to have a “fat” funnel that’s filled with products and
services for every wallet.
Well, we’re pretty much at the end of this e-manual. There’s not much to do except…
G
et S
tarted!!!!
Get
Started!!
You Know Enough to Be Dangerous
I created this manual to give you all the information that you would need to go from
knowing nothing about creating information products to knowing enough to be dangerous.
I tried not to overload you with all the minutia and tactics because I didn’t want to overload
your brain and cause to catch the disease called Information Paralysis.
If you’re sitting there not knowing where to begin, trying going back to Step #1 and
skimming through it and write down the next steps you need to take. A few pages from now
is a quick little checklist of the things you’re going to need to do to take your idea and make
it into an information product.
The one thing I don’t want you to do is to go off and buy more e-books and CDs to learn
more about creating information products. You’ll never know it all and all you need is that
simple, easy-to-follow system that will guide you through every step of the way. Instant
Niche Products is that manual and you’ve read through close to 200 pages of material and
you know enough to get started…TODAY!
Turn now to the action plan and get started today. Create that product, set up your web-site
and get your message in front of as many people as possible!
Your new career as an infopreneur awaits you!
JUST GET STARTED!!!
John Reese likes to urge his clients and readers to “just make your first dollar.” That’s
a tremendous piece of advice because no one does it. Just get started. Stop putting yourself
down about not having a list or a product or an idea. Just start thinking and figuring out
what you want to do.
Find the people with the list and reach out to them. They have the knowledge, but you have
the persistence and the determination to make it. Approach a JV partner who doesn’t have
the time, but has the knowledge to create a killer product with content that people want.
You do all the work. It will get your foot in the door and be the start of your career.
You might not have all the time in the world to go as fast as you would like, I know I didn’t
have the time. I created my info-business part-time, while working 50 to 60 hours a week.
But that’s okay as you’ll soon learn. The key is to create a plan of action, then take daily
action, little baby steps each and every day that will move you closer to your end goal. So
what if it takes a guru 3 days to put together a teleseminar and it takes you 2 weeks! Who
cares! You got it done and now you’re going to profit from it. So what if they have 50,000
affiliates and you have NONE right now. Just keep moving forward and soon you’ll reach
that uber-guru status yourself.
"There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path."
- From The Matrix
Again, don’t get caught in the whole Perfection Paralysis or Information Paralysis.
Pick your niche, research your niche, find out if there is a market and determine your hook
and just start creating that product. If you need help, just reach out to other people who are
already have created products and are making money from them. If you need help or
direction, just drop me a line. I’d love to hear from you.
[email protected]
Okay, enough reading. You’ve got a product (or ten) inside of you that’s waiting to come
out. Get it going and stop worrying about getting it right!
Here’s to your success!
Fabio Marciano
[email protected]
www.CashMoreChecks.com
www.TeleseminarMagic.com
www.BecomeAnExpertin30Days.com
www.TheOneMinuteEbook.com
www.WriteItFAST.com
www.InstantBestseller.com
www.FabmanSecrets.com
Coming Soon… www.SelfPublishingRiches.com
TTHANK
HANK Y
OU…NOW S
TART C
REATING TTHAT
HAT FFIRST
IRST
YOU…NOW
START
CREATING
P
RODUCT…NOW!
PRODUCT…NOW!
Congrats! You’ve made it to the end of this manual. I hope you’ve learned a lot and are
raring to get started on creating your first or your more profitable product.
Please TAKE ACTION!!! You’ve invested the money to buy this e-book, you’ve invested
the time to read it and not it’s time to invest a little more money and some time to create a
product that will pay dividends for the rest of your life.
Find your niche, find your starving crowd, find out what they want, give it to them and work
hard and you’ll be rewarded handsomely for your efforts.
You’re now armed with everything you need to know about creating a profitable
information product. The one thing I cannot provide you with is PASSION! You’re going to
need passion for your subject and for the product that you create. It’s up to you to supply
that. I believe I’ve provided you with everything else that you will need to know and do in
order to be successful.
I hope that less than a few months from now you’ll have your own information products
business humming along, making a nice profit for you on a monthly basis. Just create great
products, take care of your customers, and market the heck out of your products and you
should be just fine.
I would love to hear about all your trials and tribulations, especially about your success
stories that I may one day include in future editions of this manual. Don’t be shy about
reaching out to me. You can reach me at:
[email protected]
Here’s to your success!
Y
Yoouurr Q
QuuiicckkS
Sttaarrtt C
Chheecckklliisstt ffoorr P
Prrooffiittss!!
Rather than just insert a checklist of sorts for you to go through, I thought it would be
smarter to get you to sign up for the FREE e-course that will take you through the next 30
days ([email protected]).
You’ll receive your QuickStart Checklist for Profits! in addition to a great e-course, some
surprise bonuses and more!
So send an email today to [email protected]

to your Copy! - Instant Niche Products

Transcription

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