What if you were to do the exact same work and put in the exact same effort on your next product, only you made 3 tiny changes and increased your income? Here’s how…
1. Change the commission amount that you offer to affiliates. If you normally give 100% to build your list, try offering just 60 or 70% instead. Surprisingly, your affiliates will often send just as much traffic, but you get to profit as well.
Alternative: Bump the commission up to 100%. If you normally pay 50%, try bumping it up this time instead. Then offer an upsell in which you either split the commission with affiliates, or take it all yourself.
2. Insert referral links into your product. This is old school but it still works. Choose a product or two of your own that fit well with the product you’re selling and talk them up inside your new product. Don’t oversell, just mention how they will help out with whatever it is they do.
Alternative: Add the sales pages for the products as index.html files into your download zip. Or better yet, do both.
3. Place links for other products on your download page. This is prime real estate and a great place to make other offers.
Alternative: Offer your best affiliates a link to their product on your download page if they will promote your product like crazy. This works really, really well at motivating some affiliates. Decide if you want to split the profits from their products with them, or let them keep 100% of the profits.
It is surprising how often simple little tweaks can substantially add to your bottom line. You just have to test things out and see what works best for you – it’s well worth the extra few minutes it takes.
This won’t make you rich but it can make you a full time income… Every day there are new people wanting to do Internet marketing, but they don’t want to do the work. If you can take the pain of the work away from them, they will pay you handsomely for it.
The pain is in the actual “doing” of the thing. So you do the “thing” for them. What’s the “thing?” It could be creating their first product, setting up their sales funnel, building their website, writing their blog posts, putting a list building system in place… anything that needs to be done to start an online business qualifies.
Let’s say someone wants to have their own website but doesn’t know where to start. “I will create your website for you” is going to resonate with them. So you create a professional website for your customer, and then when you’re in profit and have your own service you can start marketing – you outsource the rest of the website development while you focus on building your next service.
Yes, it really can be that simple. Watch to see what people want when they’re starting their online businesses, then jump in and be the one to give it to them. It’s a guaranteed plan to make money online now, and far into the future.
That’s right – you can make 50% for products you haven’t even created or sold, simply by offering this service. There are plenty of people out there who have created products but are reluctant to bring them to market. Why? Probably because they either don’t want to spend the money it takes to launch a product, or they don’t know how to do it, or they’re simply scared. The reasons don’t matter so much. What does matter is they’ve got a great product that will sell, if it’s given the chance.
You can offer to launch the product for them.
You put up the sales page, create the membership page if it needs one, write the sales letter and get the graphics done. Or you can outsource the entire thing, depending on if you’d rather do it yourself or pay someone else to do it.
In exchange, you get 50% of the profits. The product owner gets the other 50%, of course. You get 50% of profits from sales, 50% of recurring sales, 50% access to the list and 50% if you sell off the product.
Be sure to get this in writing. Never assume, even if it’s someone you’ve known for years.
This is a win-win for both of you. The product creator gets their product out there and gets 50% of sales. You don’t have to create a product. You just handle the marketing. If you have a list and JV contacts, this will be even easier. If not, budget for solo ads, Facebook ads or Google Ads to get the ball rolling.
If you’ve never launched your own product, you might want to do that first to get the experience. Then go to forums like Warrior and find folks who have products and need help launching. Be choosy about which products you want to launch. And then make it a big success for both of you.
You already know about the BIG THREE niches: Health, Relationships and Money. It’s been estimated that as much as 80% of online revenue has something to do with these 3 niches. Of course, if you’re going into one of these niches, you’re going to want to niche it down a whole lot more. For example, Health could be: Weight loss, yoga, running, herbal remedies, healthy cooking, etc. The list is endless.
But how often do you find a great niche that isn’t in one of these three categories? That is, how often do you find a hot niche that isn’t overrun with competition? Not too often. That’s why when I stumbled on this niche, I had to tell you.
Of course, this niche is nothing novel or new. It’s simply overlooked by the vast majority of marketers. Which is a shame because it’s highly profitable and the buyers in this niche will fork over big bucks to get solutions to their problems.
So what’s the niche? Education. It’s a multi-million dollar category with an endless stream of parents ready and willing to pay to help their kids.
If you go into this niche, you’ll again want to sub-niche it down to a particular field (math) or grade level (anything from kindergarten all the way to university).
Imagine a young parent with a child who is struggling in school. Is that parent willing to pay for a course or book to help the child? You bet. How about a parent who is worried their child won’t get into a good university, or worried they can’t afford one, or just wants to help their child write term papers – the list is endless.
If you have a teaching background, or if you can enlist the help of teachers, you could probably make a small fortune in this niche. At the very least you could publish a line of Kindle books on tips and tricks to do well in each grade of school, and another series of books to show parents how to help their kids. The possibilities? Endless.
Let’s say you want to start a new business, but you need some capital to do it. Maybe you want to start making apps or some other kind of software. Or you need software for your own social networking site, or whatever. Here’s how to get others to fund it for you.
As you are building your business, record everything. Every problem you solve, every step you take, every misstep you make – take notes of everything.
Offer these notes for sale to others who want to do the same thing you’re doing. For example, if you’re building apps then you’d sell your info to other people who want to make money with apps, too.
You might offer them a weekly update as you progress. Or bundle it all together and sell it when you’re done. It’s up to you, but frankly the idea of letting your customers watch you as you set up your new business and turn a profit can be pretty exciting for them and motivating for you. Plus, you’ll get paid up front.
Offer this insider info for a reasonable price, and remember to offer an appropriate upsell as well. The right upsell will more than double your profits. Use this money to fund your business, and you’ve basically started a business for free – not a bad deal at all.
You’ve likely seen comments in IM forums such as: “How much will I have to spend to do this?” Or, “I won’t have to spend any money to start this $1,000 a week business, right?”
Yeah. Right.
Where did the notion come from that it should cost zero dollars to start a real business? If you open a barber shop or a donut shop or a flower shop, I guarantee you will need funding for the shop, the supplies, the tools, the counters, cases, inventory, etc.
Yet somehow we’re under the impression that doing it online should be free.
I have 3 words for you: Get over it.
If this is your way of thinking, then just get over it. You will spend the next year searching high and low for the magical, mythical business you can start for zero dollars and be making a grand a month within the week.
And you’re as likely to find it as you are a bag full of unicorn horns.
Here’s how a real business person would think: “Okay, I’m a marketer, not a web designer. So instead of mucking about for the next six months to build a website and a sales funnel, I’m going to outsource the whole thing and have it done in a week, two weeks tops.
“And while that is happening, I’m going to create a free report to give away to build my email list. And while I’m at it, I’m going to create an OTO (One Time Offer), too, so I can immediately start making a few sales from my new subscribers.”
Of course, if you’re not a writer, either, then you would outsource the report and the OTO as well.
The point is, if your specialty is marketing, then that’s where you need to put your focus. Let other experts handle the stuff you’re not good at while you do what you do best.
The difference between trying to do it all yourself (the “free” way) and hiring pros to help you is usually about 6 months. That’s right – try to do it all yourself and you will lose 6 months of business growth and profits.
Or it could take even longer. I know of one ‘marketer’ who has been trying to figure out the tech stuff for over two years. That’s two years he could have been building his business, but instead he’s trying to do everything himself rather than pay someone. That has got to be the most expensive version of ‘free’ that I’ve ever seen.
Outsource your challenges and focus on what you do best. This is the fastest way to get into profit, with the least amount of headaches and hassles. You’ll be glad you did.
You could not be blamed if you think a blog exists to inform and entertain its readers. After all, a blog really isn’t much different than a magazine, right? And a magazine exists to inform and entertain its readers. Right?
Actually, this is the exact point where many information marketers go horribly wrong.
Let’s pull up a quote from an ad executive named James Collins:
“There is still an illusion to the effect that a magazine is a periodical in which advertising is incidental. But we don’t look at it that way. A magazine is simply a device to induce people to read advertising. It is a large booklet with two departments – entertainment and business. The entertainment department finds stories, pictures, verse, etc. to interest the public. The business department makes the money.”
James Collins said that in ’07.
That is, 1907.
And it’s as true today as it was then. Maybe even more so, with the advent of the Internet.
Why do websites make you click links to read the following pages in an article, rather than putting it all on one page??
Why do websites make lists of “The Top 20 __” and then make you scroll through each one, rather than putting the entire list on one page? It’s to expose you, the reader, to more ads. If you have to go to 3 different pages or 20 different slides to finish an article, you’re exposed to 3 times or even 20 times the number of ads.
As a content marketer, you must focus on two things:
Providing interesting content. It could be entertaining or informative or both, so long as it captures and holds attention. But the content isn’t what’s keeping you in profit – it’s the products you’re selling. Content is simply a means to a sale.
Making a profit. This profit could come from ads on the page, or products you promote, or even products you create and sell.
One business, two functions: Entertainment and business.
When you view your business in this light, everything becomes much more clear. You suddenly know what it is that you have to do, and more importantly, what you don’t have to do.
Look at it this way: The only purpose for your content (blog posts, articles, podcasts, free ebooks, tweets, posts, etc.) is to gather the specific audience you want.
So you choose your audience and then tailor your content accordingly.
Now then, ideally you want your audience to sign up to your email list. This makes it far easier to do the business side of your business. Otherwise you are dependent on readers to click your ads or buy your products. But with a list, you can send emails to your prospects promoting products they can buy.
Your focus should be on turning every reader you can into a subscriber. And when you do, you offer them whatever it is that they already want.
Find out their desires and sell them the solutions and products they already want. Don’t try to forge new paths by educating your audience on what they “should” want. This is an uphill battle you will lose. Instead, discover what they already desire and also how they like to be sold. Then act accordingly.
Remember: Your content is simply a device to induce people to read and act upon your marketing. It’s that simple.
As you know, there is a lot of money to be made in working with offline businesses. If they don’t have a site you can build one for them. If they have a site but it’s not mobile friendly, you can build them a mobile site. If they’re not doing video, you can do that for them. If they’re not building a list, you can get that started for them and so forth. The possibilities are nearly endless, and there’s tons of support on how to do it.
But here’s the sticking point for most online marketers: They do not want to go out and talk to business owners.
So if you’re one of those who prefers to stay at your desk, then how can you cash in on offline marketing? Simple – hire a salesperson. Pay that person a commission such as 50% of profits or a straight 25% off the top. This way you only pay when you make money.
And if you don’t want to be the one to provide the services, you can always outsource that as well.
This is a great side business for marketers. You’re still free to focus on your online business, diverting your attention to offline only when there is a sale. And it’s a great opportunity for the sales person, because they can pursue it in their spare time.
And if you’re outsourcing the work, you probably only need to spend a few hours per week to make this work.
There’s an expression that the first million dollars is the hardest to earn. It’s also true that your first business is the hardest to start. But once you’ve got one business, why not branch out and create a second business?
If you do, you’ll have another revenue stream, as well as added security. After all, if you have two different lists and two different sets of products and something happens to one, you’ve still got the other.
You’ll also find that by expanding into a new business, you’ll get your old enthusiasm back. Remember when you started your first business, how exciting it was? You can have that excitement again by starting something new.
And then there’s cross promotion. Choose your second business correctly and you can market your second business’ product to the customers of your first business, and vice versa.
So let’s say you sell info products to the dating market – how about starting a dating app business, too?
Or maybe you sell financial products, like how to invest money. You could branch out to how to make money, and sell those products to your investment list, and so forth.
You might think you won’t have the time or possibly the skills to take on a second business. But no worries – just outsource the work. And remember, the true money maker in business and in marketing is creative thinking. You can always get someone else to handle the details for you.
If you’ve been in business for any length of time, you likely have hidden assets you can sell. For example, do you write a newsletter? Then you can sell a bundle of back issues. Do you send out emails? You can bundle these as well for other marketers to use.
How about blog posts – do you have enough to package them into a book? Have you developed any software? If so, you can sell the rights to it, or the resell rights.
Have you developed a squeeze page that works remarkably well? Why not sell the template?
The list goes on and on, but the bottom line is this: Take a good look at your business and see what hidden assets you can sell for a tidy profit. And continue to search for the hidden assets, because sometimes they’re hiding in plain sight.
For example, let’s say you’ve developed a system for hiring and training outsourcers for your business. You take this for granted, but to other business owners this information could be worth a great deal.
Or maybe you’ve developed a blog post template and writing system that quickly creates blog posts that tend to get shared a great deal through social media. You’ve been doing it for years, so again you take it for granted. But there are other blog owners and writers who would pay a small fortune to know what you know.
Don’t underestimate the value of your systems and various assets. There is a learning curve to everything, and guaranteed there are people out there who will pay you to help them shorten that curve.
