Stuck for ideas on what to write in your next blog post, article or email? I’ve made a list of what readers want most to see from you. In fact, this is exactly the content that people crave, so get ready to make your next content a smash hit with your audience.
Your readers want content that:
– Reminds them that they matter – Reminds them that they are one of a kind – Tells a story – Takes them on a journey – Surprises them – Shows them that dreams can come true – Has unexpected twists and unforeseeable turns – Reveals awesome secrets – Shows little Davids beating big Goliaths – Confirms their thoughts and beliefs – Challenges their assumptions in a respectful manner – Gives a fresh point of view – Takes a stand – Reminds them that life is short – really short – Gives them faith to believe in something BIG – Reminds them to get back to the “basics” – Makes them smile and laugh – Makes them cry – Educates while entertaining – Inspires them to take action – Encourages them to never, ever give up
This is the sort of content your readers never get tired of and always have time to read. If it’s really good, they remember it long after they’ve read it. And even if it’s only somewhat good, if it meets any of the above criteria, they are very likely to share it with others.
In other words, this is the kind of content that has the power to inspire, influence and move your readers to ACTION.
Can you pick a topic, build a list of 1,000 and even promote your first product in just 7 days? Yes! Here’s how…
First of course is to choose your topic or niche. If you want a head start, pick something that will interest your friends – preferably both your friends in real life and your social media friends. Let’s say you’re interested in marketing, and you’ve got some business friends in your hometown as well as more business friends online. This is a good topic choice to hit the ground running.
Next, reach out to those friends you already have a relationship with. Let them know about your new endeavor. In our example case, you might write the following:
Hey George,
Quick question for you: I’m starting a new project where I give out the latest marketing tips for small businesses like yours on how to cheaply get more customers.
Traditional advertising just isn’t cutting it anymore, and we need alternatives that don’t cost a lot and flat out work.
Anyway, thought you might be interested.
I’ll be emailing the latest ‘how-to’ info as I find it.
Want me to include you?
Jill
When they reply back, manually add them to your list. Yes, this takes a little effort, but it’s an excellent way to get started. Go through your phone, email and social media contacts and get as many people as you can this way. Don’t stop until you have a bare minimum of 50. 100 is better.
Next step – create a contest for your new subscribers.
Brainstorm a list of 3 to 5 things you could give to the winner of your contest.
Do a quick poll of your list to see which of those 3 to 5 items they would most like.
Put up a giveaway page and announce it to your list. Use one of the contest sites to make this easy. Your goal is to get them to share it with everyone.
In our example, you might write something like:
Thanks for joining me in my new project!
To kick things off, I’m giving away the book, “How to Get More Customers Than You Need.”
In fact, I’m giving away 5 of them!
And since this email is only going out to 100 people, your odds of winning are pretty darn good.
Here’s what you need to do:
Enter the giveaway by clicking here to leave your email address.
Take the special link you get when you register, and share it with your friends to improve your own odds of winning.
For every friend of yours that joins, you get another entry. Good?
Great! Here’s the link.
Jill
You might be concerned about the cost of the prize(s). You can either give away something you own or have rights to, or you can get a sponsor who gives their products away in exchange for you promoting them to your growing list. Or you can simply buy them yourself.
The point is, don’t let obstacles get in your way. There’s always going to be something – web hosting, web design, copywriting, etc., that tries to throw up a roadblock to slow you down or even stop you in your tracks. Don’t let it. Just keep moving forward and tackle each bump in the road as you get to it.
The main thing is to always stay focused on your objective. In this case, it’s 1,000 subscribers in 7 days, followed by the immediate promotion of your first product. (And don’t sweat this part, either. If you don’t have a product, I have two work-arounds for you coming up.)
Continue to promote your contest. Let other list owners know, let blogs know, let the world know about your contest. If you get one good list owner to tell their list about your contest, that alone can snowball into a thousand subscribers. Remember, those who enter the contest can then promote their own link for more entries, thus further increasing your list size.
The next step is key: Immediately start building rapport and delivering great content to your list. Give them exactly what you promised and a whole lot more. What you send them is of course going to depend on your niche. Just make sure it is info they can use to solve problems and you will do well.
Also inject humor when you can, write like you’re having a conversation with your best friend and enjoy yourself. If you’re having fun creating content, your list is having fun reading or watching it. That’s right – recording videos for your list is a great idea and can work to build rapport far faster than simply sending emails.
Finally it’s time to promote your first product. If you don’t already have a product of your own that fits this list, don’t worry about it. Choose something that your list wants and be an affiliate for that product. If you don’t know what your list wants, take a poll.
And here’s an even better technique than promoting an affiliate product – sell a product you haven’t even created yet. That’s right. Take a poll to find out exactly what they want. Then sell it to them. Let them know if it’s a book or video series or what. Let them know exactly what’s in it for them. Let them know that if you don’t get “x” amount of orders, you won’t make it. And lastly, let them know that because they are preordering before it’s even made, they get special bonuses and / or a special discount. Make it an offer they cannot refuse.
Just think: If you get 50 sales from your new list for $30 each, that’s $1,500 for a product you haven’t even created yet. Your results will vary.
Things to remember:
Your friends want to help you. Sometimes it’s easier to ask strangers for help than it is your friends and family. But the people who know you are the ones who will join your list first and promote your contest first. They get the ball rolling for you because they want to see you succeed.
Don’t hide. Yes, you can email until you’re blue in the face, and you will get results. You can also pick up the phone and call people to let them know about your new endeavor. Guaranteed, those you call will be far more likely to promote your contest and buy your product.
You might even randomly call people from your list just to thank them for joining. They will be blown away. In fact, send out an email to your list telling them you will call them on Skype for a 2 minute chat if they like – just reply with their Skype ID and you’ll call. Even those who don’t answer will be intrigued that you would do something like that. It shows you are a real person who wants to make real connections. And that counts for a lot.
You can also send private messages to people on your list through Facebook and Gmail if they have a Gmail address. Ask what kind of help they might need and what they want to accomplish.
If you want to make more sales of your first product, wait another week or two before promoting to build more trust with your list. Build rapport. Build a relationship. THEN promote your new product or future new product. Sales will likely double the amount you would make by promoting after just the first week.
Continue to build your list. 1,000 subscribers is a good start. Now go for 3,000. You can do it. In fact, it gets easier and easier as you go. Do lots of guest blogging – it’s a great way to list build.
Create a list-building incentive that drives people wild. This will take some brainstorming, but the perfect incentive is one that people would gladly and eagerly pay for with real money. When you figure out what this is for your niche, your list building will skyrocket.
Don’t get lazy. Building a good list quickly takes effort. Building rapport with that list takes even more effort. But in the end it can pay off big. VERY big.
This is so basic, a lot of people might dismiss this without another thought. However if they do, they’ll be missing out on one of the single greatest secrets to continuously increase their income month in and month out, for the rest of their lives…
Here’s how it works: Look at what you earned last month. Whatever it is, write it down.
Now set a goal to earn a certain percentage more this month. 5% works well. For example, if last month you earned $500, this month your goal is $525.
Now track what you earn every day. That’s right – every DAY. If you’re not on target to beat last month’s total, then do something. Send out another promotion. Create a viral report. Do another guest post. Whatever it takes, make sure you reach your new goal. Odds are you will not only reach it, you will exceed it.
Now rinse and repeat month in and month out.
“But this is too hard!” You might be thinking. Nope. It’s not. You’re taking 2 minutes a day to record how much you earned the day before. You’re keeping track of whether or not you’re on target. And you’re pushing yourself to do a little bit better each month.
The alternative is to flounder around like a dying fish, hoping you somehow land back in the water. Odds are most months you’re not going to. A year passes, and you’re making the same amount of money each month as you are now – or maybe you’re making less. Not pretty.
But increase your income just 5% each month, starting with just a current income of $500 a month, and it can look like this:
12 month mark $900 a month 18 month mark $1,200 a month 24 month mark $1,600 a month
What if you’re currently earning $1,000 a month, and you increase your goal by 10% each month?
12 month mark $3,100 a month 18 month mark $5,500 a month 24 month mark $9,700 a month
Now do you see the power of setting goals and continually tracking your results? Two minutes a day can produce riches. Or, you could spend those two minutes watching a cat video on YouTube. Your choice.
Let’s say you write and sell a fairly successful monthly newsletter. How can you get your subscribers to bring you new subscribers? Or maybe you have a growing membership. How do you get your current members to bring you more paying members? The answer might be as simple as giving your existing members certificates to GIVE to their friends…
In the case of the newsletter, let your subscribers give away 1-6 months for free. Limit the number of gift subscriptions they can give away to keep the perceived value high. Make the gift certificates look like they were paid for by your current subscribers, so that when they give them out, it appears they’re giving a valuable gift (which they are.) This also makes it more likely your subscribers will give the certificates out because there is a sense of pride in the giving of the gift.
When the gift recipients sign up to get their free subscriptions, you can offer them the chance to subscribe for a longer period of time at a reduced rate. Some will accept your offer, others won’t. Those who opt only for the free subscription will receive your offers to renew before their subscription ends. If you’ve provided a great value to them, some will subscribe. And when they do, you can then offer them certificates to give to their friends as well.
Remember, since your newsletter is delivered electronically, it costs almost nothing to give out gift subscriptions. And even if your newsletter is printed and mailed, the cost is still low compared to the number of new subscribers you are likely to get using this simple method. Of course, you’ll want to track your numbers to be sure it’s profitable.
Memberships can work the same way. Let your current members give away limited-time memberships to a small handful of the people they think will appreciate it the most.
You might even do special promotions using this method. For example, you give out certificates in late April for Mother’s Day with instructions to give them to moms who would enjoy the subscription or membership. Or prior to Christmas as gifts, and so forth.
If your membership or newsletter delivers a high value, using your current customers to bring in more customers can be the easiest, fastest and most cost effective way to get a continuous stream of new, happy customers into your business.
Therefore, instead of only thinking about how many of your paid newsletter subscriptions or memberships you can sell, start directing your creative juices to finding ways you can leverage your existing subscriber and customer base’s enthusiasm for your services to start GIVING AWAY everything you have to offer. As you do this, your business and influence can start growing exponentially, and with less overall effort and advertising investment on your part.
Guaranteed, you’ve been on the customer side of this equation. You buy a product and you think you’re going to be directed to the download page. Instead, you find yourself on an upsell page trying to sell you another product.
No problem, you scroll to the bottom and click the ‘no thanks’ link, thinking you’re about to get to the download page.
No such luck. You’re on another upsell page. You scroll down and click ‘no thanks’ again, and you’re taken to…
… yet another upsell page. Now you’re getting irritated. You scroll down, click the ‘no thanks’ button, and you’re finally taken to…
… another upsell page! @#$%&
You’re no longer just irritated, you’re annoyed, mad and even downright ANGRY. Odds are you are talking to your computer and what you’re saying is not very nice.
Who can blame you?
Now then, let’s look at this from the marketer’s standpoint: The more offers you as the marketer can make, the more money you will make.
Today, that is.
But when you make your customers angry, what happens? They remember how you made them feel. In fact, they will remember how you made them feel long, long after they’ve forgotten your product. And the next time you try to sell them something, they’ll decide they’re going to stay far away from your offers because they do NOT want to get caught in upsell hell ever again.
So what’s the solution? Offer ONE upsell. Just one. Then take your buyers straight to the download page.
On the download page, you can offer them another product with a nice discount. You’re not holding their purchase hostage at this point because they’re able to download it. So they’re not going to resent you for making them another offer, especially if they get it at a reduced price.
Then in your autoresponder sequence, you can offer them all the upsells, down sells and cross sells you like interspersed with helpful info, news and so forth.
The bottom line comes down to this: If you want to be a flash in the pan and make all of your money today, use a ton of upsells. No one will buy from you again, but it won’t matter because you’ll be living on the beach somewhere carving coconuts.
But if you want to build a long term business, then respect your customers and never, ever put them through upsell hell again.
First, the bad news: If you’re telling customers that you’re only selling “X” number of your digital product, they’re going to think you’re a scammer.
Think about it. Back in 2000, you could tell people you’re only selling 1,000 copies and they would believe you. But it’s 2020, and people have seen this tactic so many times, they not only don’t believe you – it makes them question everything else you say.
Plus, how shortsighted can you be to limit how much money you make? Let’s say you put out a truly great product, but to create scarcity and make sales you decide to limit either the number of products sold, or the time during which you will sell them.
You make the sales, you pull the product, and your income goes to zero. That could be a big long-term loss for you.
Or worse yet, you claim you will pull the product but you don’t. Or you say you “may” stop selling, but you don’t. Or you stop selling for 2 days or 2 weeks or 2 months, and then you open it up again.
And your credibility goes out the door.
So how do you create scarcity of digital products without losing sales and credibility?
You need to have a legitimate reason for creating the scarcity. For example, if you’re selling PLR, then obviously you can’t flood the market with thousands of copies or the PLR will lose its value.
But most products can be sold forever without causing the buyers a problem. So in that case, what do you do to create scarcity? You use the second method, which is…
… Bonus packages. And the good news: It’s easy, it’s highly effective, and done correctly it can create sales for you for a long time to come.
Here’s how it works:
Go to other marketers who sell products that compliment yours. These should be products that have only been sold and have never been given away. Otherwise they lose their value.
Ask these marketers if you can do a deal: You get to give away their product to your next 50 / 500 / 1,000 customers or all of your customers during the next week / two weeks / month. In return they get a percentage of your profits, along with the email addresses of all the buyers.
Not many marketers will say no to this offer. They get paid for sales they’re expending no effort to make. PLUS they get the email address of every buyer so they can sell them more products later.
And the best part is, you can repeat this as many times as you like, always offering new products as your limited bonuses. Maybe you offer the “XYZ” product to early bird buyers during the first 10 days only. Then during the next month you offer the “ABC” product, and the month after that, the “DEF” product and so forth.
True, in theory you could offer this bonus forever, except that in reality the owner of the product you’re giving away has the final say on how many copies you can give out. And as you tell your customers, you have to follow their rules or you can’t give away any of their products.
See how this works?
Added bonus for you: You’re creating alliances with these product owners. If you treat them right you’ll be able to do more deals with them in the future as well.
Bottom Line: By using REAL scarcity in this manner, you can continue to sell your product for a long time to come. And your customers will respect you for it, too.
Which one would you remember: “Pete and Earl’s Hair Salon for Men,” or “Best Head Salon?” How about “The Best Irrigation Installation and Repair” or “Dirty Boots Irrigation?”
Choosing a memorable name for your business, service or product can actually increase your business, for 3 reasons:
– People can remember it in conversation with others. “Check out the “Stealth Remodeler,” he does work during off-hours so he won’t bother your customers.
– People remember it each time they see it. They might forget a generic name and not realize they’ve seen it over and over again online in forums, on blogs and so forth. But a memorable name they will remember. “Hey, I see that product or service everywhere, it must be good!”
– People can remember it when they need your product or service. “I’ve got to get a new window, so I’ll call the one window place I remember: ‘Peek-a-boo Windows.’” Or, “I need help with my website SEO, I’ll Google ‘Naked SEO’ because I remember their name from an article I read.”
Everything else being equal, the catchy, memorable name will win the business.
Let’s say you have a product for brick and mortar businesses on how to get more customers. If you take the exact same information that is in your product, but customize it for a specific niche, you can charge more AND make more sales.
For example, you customize the info for chiropractors and market it exclusively to chiropractors. Sales will actually be easier to make for a couple of reasons.
First, it’s easier to reach your audience when you are being specific. Second, chiropractors will see the info is just for them, and be far more likely to buy than if it was generic. So it’s easier to reach your audience, and easier to sell to them when you find them.
But perhaps the biggest benefit of all is that you can sell your product for more money because it is geared specifically towards chiropractors. And you can do this in multiple niches: Contractors, lawyers, accountants, dentists, etc.
Let’s use another niche – weight loss. You have a generic product on how to lose weight, which means you are competing against every other weight loss product out there. But if you focus your product just for men over 60, or just for college women, or just for people in cold climates who can’t get outside to exercise, you’ve created more opportunities to target and sell your information. And you can continue to customize your info as many times as you can find markets. If you can reach your specific audience, you can do this.
This could be a business all on its own. You can go to any product owner and strike a deal where you take their info and customize it and then sell it. If you do, be sure you negotiate for a high percentage of the profits, since you will be doing the customizing and the work.
Or better yet, simply buy rights to the information and then you can keep all the profits for yourself.
Are there really any good reasons NOT to launch your amazing new product? Take this quiz to find out so you don’t make the same critical mistakes that have destroyed many other businesses and entrepreneurs from the word GO…
Ok, check all that apply:
1. __ Another marketer has just launched a product very similar to yours, and if you launch your product now, you’ll look like a copycat.
2. __ You just got word that another launch for a similar product bombed in a very big way – almost no one bought it. You’ll look like an idiot if you launch your product.
3. __ A big guru in your niche just started the launch process of a very similar product. His first video is out, and once he releases the fourth video everyone on the planet will be promoting his product.
4. __ There are already several free versions of products quite similar to yours – thus there is no reason anyone would buy your product when they can get the same info for free.
Did you pick which scenarios should stop you from launching your product right now?
Okay, let’s see how you did.
Answers:
1. This happens more often than you think. And yes, product creators do pull their product launch when they see someone else has just launched something similar. And you know what? Those product creators are fools. Here’s a true story to illustrate why:
Recently a popular marketer was just about to launch a product he’d worked on for a long time. He had everything in place to launch – all he had to do was press the button to send out the first email.
But someone else launched a VERY similar product that was selling like gangbusters. So he decided not to launch. Which made him sad. So late that night, when he was feeling down, he said, “Screw it!” and hit the launch button. $61,000 in profits later, he was very, VERY happy he had launched his look alike product.
Do not worry about what others are selling. If you’ve done your research into what your customers want, you WILL make sales. And sometimes you’ll make those sales to the exact same people who bought your competitor’s product, too! Don’t wait, don’t hesitate – launch your product.
2. If their product didn’t sell, yours won’t either, right? Wrong. You’ve done your research and you know what your customers want. Your customers trust you. They like you. They buy your stuff.
So of course you’re going to launch your product, because whatever that other marketer did or did not have going on does not affect you. And neither do rumors, so don’t pay any attention to them. Stop second guessing yourself and launch your product.
3. Oh no, you can’t compete with the “big cheese,” can you? Who says you have to? Your customers are YOUR customers. Your affiliates are YOUR affiliates. It’s common for similar products to hit the market at nearly the same time and have both do well. So don’t worry about it. Just launch your product.
Have you noticed a pattern yet? I hope so. Okay, onto the last one…
4. What is the perceived value of “free?” Low. Very low. In fact, no free product can compete with your paid product, because as everyone believes, they get what they pay for. That’s why free is never your competition. So launch your product. Now.
In fact the only real competition you ever have is in your mind. So don’t worry about who is launching what or when they are launching. In fact, stop reading your emails when you’re in product creation mode and just focus on your task – creating the content and products your customers want. Everything else will take care of itself.
Let’s say you run across an affiliate program for a product with recurring payments, such as a membership site or software. Because it’s recurring payments, you sell it once and you get paid over and over again, for months or possibly even years. Everything else being equal, these are always the best types of products to promote because the income just keeps coming and coming.
Naturally you want to make as many sales of these as possible, so the question becomes: Other than your usual methods of promotion, how can you get more subscribers to this affiliate program?
Try an old school method that still works – creating a viral report.
In the report, teach how to do whatever it is that the product does. Teach the method in detail, step-by-step. Leave nothing out. Then at the end, let the reader know that they don’t have to do any of what you just said. Instead, they can get the same results a whole lot faster and easier by subscribing to the affiliate program.
Simple, right? First you show how complicated it is to do it by hand. Then you give them an easy way to get the same result – by subscribing. And you give your affiliate link.
And by the way, this is the ONLY affiliate link you put in the entire report.
Now then, here are few tips to make this work:
– Create a report good enough to sell. This should be high quality.
– Make the report short enough that readers can easily finish it in one sitting. You want every reader to reach the end so they see the affiliate link.
– Whenever possible, focus on telling your reader what to do, but not how to do it. This way they’re more likely to take the easy way out and subscribe to your affiliate program, rather than figure out details for themselves.
– Give your report an absolutely KILLER title that makes people want to read it and share it.
– Leave your name off of your report. This will encourage others to share it with their lists.
– Give anyone and everyone who has the report the right to distribute the report exactly as it is with no alterations. They can use it as a bonus, as a list building incentive and so forth.
– If you’ve written a sales page for the report, let others use the sales page and put their own name on it. Yes, they can absolutely charge for the report if they like, so long as they leave your affiliate link in place.
The idea is to get as many people as possible sharing your report. The more your report is distributed around the net, the more chances you have to make sales.
This is a very old school method that can still be quite effective if you follow these steps. And of course you can repeat this method as many times as you like.
Imagine if you have a dozen of these reports, each with an affiliate link to a recurring payment program. You let other marketers give your reports away as bonuses and whatnot. And you let marketers sell them and keep all the profits.
Thousands upon thousands of copies can be distributed using these methods. And even if only 1 out of 100 who get the report subscribe for a few months to your programs, you’ll still make out like a bandit.
