When I first started out online 8-years ago, we hit some dead-ends pretty fast – but in doing so found one specific online business plan that really works no matter who puts it into action.
The reason is really quite simple...product ownership.
Would you rather be a salesman or the owner of a rapidly expanding, highly profitable online business?
Sure, as a salesperson, you can make some nice money, but at the end of the day you are still trading time for money and your income has a definite ceiling. Add to that the fact that you are still under the control of sales managers, the company you work for and suddenly it doesn’t seem like such a great deal does it?
But…if you are the owner of a hot selling product that brings in high margins of 80% or more AND the value of your business continues to grow month-by-month – then that is a very liberating and exciting feeling.
So, when we outlined this online business plan a little over 8 years ago (in it’s first version), the focus was on OWNING a portion of a hot market using a very fast and highly valued method of marketing information. A technique that almost anyone could follow and repeat very quickly and that was EXTREMELY profitable with built-in leverage since YOU owned the product – and had full control of your business all the way through.
There are 10 steps to this proven online business plan, and while this may seem like a great deal of work, the fact is that you can master this entire process in as little as 6-weeks while still working away at your current job.
So here is the plan.
1. Find a hot desire within a target market by visiting forums, discussion groups, blogs and social networking sites that clearly indicate a niche market with an interest in a subject area. Then, pull out the biggest frustration, challenge or desire from withing that market – this will tpyically be a question like "How do I keep 10-pounds off for more than 6-months" or "What investment plan should I follow given today’s highly volatile economy?"
2. Create a blog on the topic and post daily for a few weeks to build traffic. By blogging and submitting to various blog directories as well as social networking sites you will get more traffic along with some backlink advantage from authority sites improving your search engine position over time. You are "putting up your sign" for your new online business.
3. Start building your list right away by putting an opt-in forum with a bonus download on your main page(s). List building is so important because…
a) 8 out of 10 visitors will not buy on first visit to your site
b) You can double (and often triple or more) your conversion of visitors to sales by exposing them multiple times to your sales page
c) You can survey your list for further ideas, case studies, or sell them other people’s products and make affiliate commissions
d) You’ll have an eager group of customers highly motivated to buy from you in the future
4. Create your own book, ebook, manual, course, guidebook or formula in the form of either a digital written, audio or video product OR in the form of a physical print or Audio/Video shipped on CD or DVD. Address the major desire you researched in step 1 and structure the information as your own solution system. You can see an outline on how to structure your information product business in this free video.
5. Write your compelling sales letter by targeting specific desires within your marketplace and turning those desires into benefit statements. For each compelling question your market has explicitly asked or is thinking about you should have a solution in your infoproduct and a benefit statement on your sales page.
6. Generate traffic by using multiple techniques such as writing articles submitting them to high authority article directories, publishing to your blog on a daily basis, advertising using pay-per-click, becoming active on leading social networking sites and emphasizing your affiliate program.
7. Seek out JV partners and super affiliates. Setup your affiliate program using the capability built into Clickbank or using other affiliate tracking software – then actively seek out top affiliates within your marketplace. Make it a part of your system to seek out at least 3-4 top JV partners each month.
8. As you begin selling your products (or giving away early review copies) work with your customers to build PROOF that your information and system works. This will build momentum and result in many more ebooks being sold. The entire process of building proof around your product should be built into the original design – for example, you can’t hope to get proof if you haven’t structured your infoproduct as something that is testable or usable.
9. Monitor and improve by building in an ongoing testing and monitoring function into your business system. What is working, what is not and make adjustments. For instance, you may be getting a TON of traffic, but conversion sucks – so you make changes to your sales letter. Or, you may suffering for traffic, so work a little harder at writing more (or better) articles, blog posting, and recruiting affiliates who can flood your site with traffic. It’s a plan-do-review process that leads to top selling sites.
10. Finally, structure your communications to your subscribers and customers in a way that they guide your business toward the best opportunities. By allowing comments to blog postings, surveying your subscribers and customers, speaking with your customers 1:1 and running frequent brainstorming or coaching calls your customers will tell you exactly what they want giving you the biggest advantage of all to stay ahead of your competition.
This exact plan has led to dozens of successful information product businesses in 15 different niche market segments (and counting). To find out more about the detailed plan and mentoring program behind putting this proven plan into action in YOUR business, visit InfoMarketer’sZone
Trackbacks/Pingbacks