Part 30: Five Marketing Questions for Info Product Success

It is often said that the only people who make real money online
are those who create their own products. I don’t happen to
believe that this is necessarily true, but we’ll let that ride
for a moment.

If we do accept that creating your own info products is the way
to riches, why then, are there so many people who have gone to
all the huge effort to make products but still struggle to make
any sales?

The answer is the order in which you do your work.

Years ago there was a successful offline book published (long
before the Internet) called ‘Is There a Book Inside You?’ that
taught the process of turning your own pre-existing passions and
knowledge into a real-life book.

The very idea of ‘writing a book’ seems to be a dream for many
people. We naturally hold authors in high regard, and have a
strange feeling that writing a book puts a person on a different
level.

The book is the end result. Seeing your name on the cover is the
real objective – the concept of actually selling it comes a
distant second.

The vanity publishing industry has grown up to service this
desire to be a published author.

Getting back to the order of work, the old way starts with what
is inside of you – what you know about (or can research), what
you are passionate about and what you will feel proud to put your
name to.

After that comes the process of writing and in third place (if at
all) comes the vague notion of selling it to other people.

For many people that last step is ignored completely – especially
the vanity publishers. To them, having a single copy of their
book on their bookshelf is the end in itself. Selling it to other
people is actually a bit embarrassing!

If all you want is a book on your shelf to make you feel
important in your own eyes and that of your family, fine. This
order of work is no problem. But if sales are on your agenda, if
your real objective is to eventually make money from your work,
then you must order your work completely differently.

The secret is in the word that describes what we are: marketers.

A ‘marketer’ is defined as: One that sells goods or services in
or to a market.

Note that the definition is in two parts:

a. One who sells goods or services
b. In or to a market.

You can’t have one without the other. If you are ‘a’, you must
have ‘b’ – otherwise you are not a marketer, you are a dreamer.

You can write the best book in the world on your chosen subject -
the one that everyone says you have to be passionate about – but
if that subject doesn’t have a pre-existing market, you will be
an author, but not a marketer.

So if you want to be an information product producer who actually
makes sales – and fulfils that promise that info product
producers make the real money online – you must first and
foremost find a market.

And you do that by answering what I call the ‘Five Marketing
Questions’:

1. Are there people out there who want to know what you know?

2. Are there lots of them?

3. Are they hungry for your information or just casually
interested?

4. Will what you have to say satisfy one of the basic human needs
that drive us all: money, health, love, security, self-esteem,
entertainment?

5. Are they already proven to be prepared to spend money on
information products?

These five marketing questions are not optional. To write a
successful information product, it has to tick all those boxes.

The fewer the ticks, the less successful the product will be. It
is as simple as that.

Many, many books (and nowadays ebooks) tick none of the boxes at
all. The author has just gone ahead and written something that he
or she is passionate about in the vague hope that someone will
share that view. But it doesn’t work that way and those many,
many authors end up bitterly complaining that Internet marketing
doesn’t work. All they have to show for their often considerable
efforts is a deep regret over the time they have wasted.

I’m certainly not saying that you shouldn’t write about things
you are passionate about – only that you need to explore your
subject to find an angle that will make it hypnotically appealing
to as many people as possible.

Before you commit yourself to the hard, and often frustrating
task of writing a book, first ask yourself if there are plenty of
people who might be interested in buying – and why. Ask the five
questions and only start work when you can satisfactorily answer
them all.

Let’s look at a simple example.

If, for instance, your passion is the history of the Roman Empire
in England and you yearn to write a book about your beloved
subject what should you do? Assuming you are not a well-known
academic, it is unlikely that you’ll readily find a paper and ink
publisher, so self-publishing is your only option.

Does your subject tick any of the five marketing questions?

Well, no. Probably none.

But wait a minute – how can you repurpose your subject to satisfy
both your longing to share your knowledge, and stand a better
chance of finding a market and making sales?

How about ‘A Tourist’s Guide to the 25 Most Exciting Ancient
Roman Sites in Southern England’?

Now we have a real possibility. There are lots of tourists and
they are proven to buy guidebooks by the thousand. A good sales
letter can make it appeal to the desire for self-esteem and
entertainment, there is a long history (pardon the pun) of
successful guides to historic sites and tourists are generally
well motivated (hungry) to buy the latest stuff around.

Boxes ticked. And as bonuses, note that the notional title
specifies ‘Southern England’ – leaving the option there for a
sequel or upsell on ‘Northern England’. And how about the next 25
sites? I smell a series!

Rather than seeing the subject as a dry historian, we are now
looking at it like a marketer.

So in summary, selling your own information products is a great
way to make money online (not the only way, but a good one
nonetheless). But it is only a good way if your focus from the
outset is on selling, rather than writing.

My five marketing questions will help you assess your ideas and I
suggest that you vigorously filter all your ideas through them.
Work on your ideas until you have five ticks: anything less and
you’ll be selling yourself short.

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