It creates easier sales
It creates more loyal customers
It creates more repeat and referral business.

Trust me. Don’t skip that part of planning your business.
But once you get that done, then what?
Well that’s what I want to talk to you about in the next couple issues here. About what the rest of your communication should be about.
This is something else you shouldn’t take lightly, because if your communication to prospects and client’s isn’t doing this specific thing, then you’ll be struggling down the path to failure.

Time to explain what I’m talking about. Let’s dive in To higher profits and beyond,

Rich

Your Second Most Important Communication

By Rich Schefren

OK. We’ve spent the last few issues talking about communicating with your market. Specifically how you shape your personal narrative.
Once you get that down, you’re going to be way ahead of the game. But you’re far from done.

Today I want to start talking a little more in depth about another area of communication that is vital to your business. One that can accelerate your success, or leave you stuck in the mud spinning your wheels.
The area I’m talking about is…

FREE CONTENT

More specifically, free content that actually makes sales.
You see, if the content you produce and give away isn’t clearly moving you closer to the sale, it’s actually moving you further away.
So let me tell you a little bit of the back story. You see, I was out West a little over a year ago consulting for a well-known guru I’m sure you’ve heard of. He’s not in internet marketing but he’s been around for quite a long time. And his company is about a little over ten million dollars.
They flew me out to get my input because sales had been flat.
More specifically, the launches that they had done were mediocre at best. Sales from their blog were basically non-existent. Sales from the content emails they sent out barely moved the needle at all. And even their webinars and teleseminars really didn’t have the impact that they were hoping for.
Now whenever I hear something like this I’m always thinking there is a problem in the way the content is being structured. More specifically, is the content that’s being delivered actually furthering the sale? Is it advancing customer’s desire to purchase the product that the company, guru, etc. is hoping to sell?
You see, the big mistake this client was making, one I see so many people make these days, is thinking, "if we provide really good content, people will automatically want to buy our stuff."

Guess what.

That simply isn’t the case –

And it hasn’t been the case for quite a long time.

Valuable content for content’s sake, on its own and without a strategic plan behind it will not get more people to buy from you. Today we live in an age where great content is all around us. So the simple fact you are offering someone great content doesn’t have the impact that it once. It doesn’t motivate buyers with regard to actually stimulating a sale like it did when great content was much more scarce. .
So that’s what we’re going to talk about. Content. Specifically the type of content that actually increases desire. The type of content that actually stimulates a sale.

Are you suffering from weak content?

Well, the easiest way to get a grasp on whether or not this really applies to you is how effective is whatever free content you’re putting out there is actually generating sales?
For example, I’m well-known for the reports that I’ve put out, the free reports that I’ve put out to the public. In each of those reports I’ve made millions of dollars based on the sales that they cause. So that’s what I’m talking about.
If you’re putting out content that doesn’t stimulate sales, then you really got to scratch your head and ask yourself why you’re putting out that content in the first place and could that content be better? Could it actually create the sales that you desire?

It can.

When you create great content that actually does advance the sale; that does create desire, what happens is that you build a momentum in your business where that content that is out there for free for the prospects and your marketplace to eat up and to consume, continuously increases your sales. Continuously brings new prospects and new customers into the fold. That’s when you have content that is really effective.
So let’s talk about really why people have this problem. There are two different concepts that have floated around the market that I believe really cause more harm than they do good.

The first and most problematic is called…

"Moving the Free Line."

This is the standard response entrepreneurs offer when they see the content they’re currently offering isn’t getting the results they hope for.
If you’re a BGS or Founders Club member, you’ve probably heard me talk about Earl Nightingales comment about why you don’t want to do what the rest of the market is doing. This is a perfect case in point.

Anyway, the concept here is that we’re going to give more away than has been given away before. Somehow magically because we’re doing that, people are automatically going to buy from us. That simply is not the case.

Think about this for just a second. if your content isn’t creating sales in the first place, how is giving more of it away going to help? Still that’s the mindset that most entrepreneurs work from.

If your content doesn’t create greater demand your content is not effective. So the idea of moving the free line, while it’s a clever statement, doesn’t really capture in its essence what is necessary to create demand and make sales.
Now there are a number of other content mistakes that entrepreneurs make as well. But i’m going to cover them in the next issue, so create any content in your marketing, stay tuned!

Questions or Comments on this issue?
Click here to send them to Rich!

———————————————————————-

Until Next time…

Wes

www.SpidersMarketingWeb.com

Information publishing is the ideal Carefree Business. It’s one of the largest and most profitable industries in the world, full of entrepreneurs making great livings. And, there is plenty of room for newcomers to get in on the action.

In today’s essay, Gary Scott shows you how to create profitable information products, the first step to getting your business off the ground.

Cheers,

Jason Holland
Managing Editor
The Carefree Entrepreneur

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The Secret Qualities of Successful Information Products
By Gary Scott

If someone asked you, "What’s the biggest chunk of the U.S. economy?" … you probably wouldn’t say "information."

But, expenditures on information and information products account for over half of this country’s economy. That’s roughly $5 TRILLION!

Why so much? Americans have an unquenchable thirst for information. We crave information to make us healthier … wealthier … more beautiful. But most of all, we want information so we can show others how much we know.

I’ve developed a highly-successful publishing business selling information that people want. You can, too.

The key is developing an information product that people not only want to buy but want to continue to buy (or renew). This isn’t hard – if you understand the following 7 Qualities of Successful Information Product Development.

Quality #1: Is the Idea Interesting?

Interesting ideas connect with a genuine fundamental aspect of life. And, the first person they have to interest is you. If you pick ideas that interest you, research and writing will be fun. But, interest goes beyond that. Your idea has to be truly interesting to your reader.

For example, my first retail publishing idea in the early 1970s was for U.S. investors to invest globally. The idea was sound and remained very interesting for a long time.

On the other hand, look at collectables. There will always be a collectables market. Yet, many collectables are attractive only because they are in vogue.

If, for example, you had a publication about Beanie Babies back when they were in vogue, you could have done well. Today, that publication would fall on its face.

Fads offer attractive publishing opportunities, but they don’t last. Publications about interesting topics survive.

Quality #2: Is the Idea Legal and Ethical?

I once got a letter about how I could mail First Class letters for only 3 cents! Indeed, the stamp on the envelope was 3 cents.

This seemed interesting, since I spend hundreds of thousands a year on postage. The letter promised that, for $12, I could get details on how to mail First Class letters for 3 cents.

This was too good to be true, but I was interested. A few days later, I got one photocopied page telling me how to do it. The page claimed that, as a business, the Post Office had made an offer to send my mail at the current rate. And it claimed that, as a businessman, I could counteroffer by putting a 3-cent stamp on my letters instead. If the Post Office accepted and mailed my letters, they accepted my offer. The idea was to simply mail all your letters with a 3-cent stamp, because most would get through. And, the idea was neither legal nor ethical.

The Postal Service’s Revenue Protection Department operates by spot inspection, true enough. So, yes, many of these 3-cent letters would get through. But, anyone mailing lots of them could expect to be investigated by the U.S. government. So, in the long run, it wouldn’t have been profitable. The fines (not to mention prison time) for these kinds of actions are very heavy.

Quality #3: Is the Idea Attractive?

Your idea has to attract first-time buyers. It doesn’t have to be pretty or pleasant. But, it must attract.

Attractiveness appeals to emotions in some way. The emotions can be good, bad, or even ugly. For example, one ad that worked well read, "I’m mad as heck at the government for cheating us – here’s how to get even." It’s not a very pretty idea. But, it’s certainly attractive.

A publication must hold your reader’s interest to succeed in the long-term. But, attractiveness gets potential readers to drop everything, read a sales story, and buy your publication.

Quality #4: Is the Idea Usable?

Your idea has to fill some need for your reader. This is vital to gaining repeat customers for your publication. The idea has to work for its readers.

A publication can be entertaining. With a golf publication, for instance, the pleasure of reading about golf courses may be enough to make it useful if the main goal is to give the reader satisfaction through description.

On the other hand, the goal might be to help the reader know how to get lower golf scores (pride). Or, show times at various courses when greens fees are reduced (savings).

Quality #5: Is the Idea Understandable?

Some years ago, the book A Brief History of Time was a New York Times bestseller for over a year. It was called one of the most-purchased/least-read books of all time. The author’s next books didn’t sell well. His books – all of them about quantum science – were just too complicated.

Ask: Is my information understandable for my target market? As A Brief History of Time shows, being interesting can sell a book. But if it’s not understandable, you won’t build repeat business.

Quality #6: Is the Idea Timely?

A successful publication is tuned to the times. If it’s too far ahead of or behind its time, it won’t do well in the long run.

I failed to understand this quality in the 1970s when I was first writing about investing internationally. I’d lived abroad for nearly a decade, so this idea seemed obvious. However, it ran contrary to public thought.

Twenty years later, most U.S. investors were ready for this idea. Today, it is so common that local stockbrokers give free talks on the subject, so we’ve had to adapt. Because I understand this quality, I’m able to change, update, and innovate my publications constantly.

Quality #7: Is the Idea Sellable?

In publishing, marketing is a very important part of success. You can have the timeliest, most usable, interesting, easy-to-apply idea in the world. But if you cannot sell it, you won’t make money. Defining your market and deciding how to sell your idea correctly is an integral part of the product creation.

I learned this lesson while pioneering the idea of investing abroad. As I said, my idea was right … but ahead of its time. Because I was out of sync with most American investors, my original selling failed.

The product wasn’t salable until I discovered avenues that led me closer to the small percentage of Americans who were interested. This process of understanding the customer is called "focus," and it’s crucial to publishing success. For example, I found that though I marketed across the country to all professions and religions, a large percentage of my original readers were Jewish, Southern, or chiropractors – groups that had less trust in the establishment. Once I understood that all three of these groups perceived that the establishment had been, at one time or another, biased against them, I was able to zero in and focus my sales in those areas.

Tap Into the Unquenchable Thirst for Information

People in the United States – and all over the world – are seeking information and advice on every topic imaginable.

And as a Carefree Entrepreneur, you can tap into that desire with your own information-publishing business. You can set it up from home – and work completely online if you want.

Gary Scott, a multimillion-dollar information publisher, has created a program to show you the ropes.

In his program, Self-Fulfilled: How to Be a Writer and Publisher, you get a proven plan for getting your publishing business going, step-by-step, with little startup capital. Plus, Gary shares the top contacts in the industry who’ll be happy to help you.

Get all the details here.

—————————————————————————

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Let me tell you about a long-time client of mine. Because he is a multi-faceted information marketer, it’s not easy to accurately describe his business. It’ll take a few minutes.

He publishes a book and a home-study course about earning finder’s fees in the real estate investment world – the finder’s fee idea of my invention. These information products are sold via direct-mail letters, magalogs, booklets, and postcards, as well as websites and tele-seminars and through affiliates.

To get that far, he required copywriting for a collection of sales letters, magalogs, booklets, postcards, and websites, then, as soon as that was working, a series of ‘back-end’ letters to stop refunds and help retention; to get the buyers to attend follow-up training conference calls and tele-seminars where other courses are sold; and a letter to recruit affiliates to let him promote his products to their lists.

Next, all these course buyers needed to be sold into coaching programs – requiring another wave of sales letters, booklets, audio CD scripts, websites, email campaigns. Now that all that’s working, campaigns are needed for three different boot camps and an annual conference.

Next, we’re in discussion to have me (a) re-create all that for a different personality with a different kind of opportunity likely to appeal to these same customers and to the much larger number of unconverted leads, and (b) re-create the original system to be aimed at a higher level, more affluent, more sophisticated target audience.

Each successful step in the evolutionary growth and expansion of his business provides the next copywriting project I’m needed for. It should be noted he is also using other freelance copywriters and content writers for less critical and difficult project work.

This guy runs his business with his wife, two employees, works part-time, generates over $5-million a year with high net profits, and pays me well for my contributions – and better yet, is zero hassle. We speak once a month during a pre-scheduled phone call, otherwise communicate by fax. As soon as I finish one thing, we contract for the next.

He is not at all unusual.

As a matter of fact, there are thousands just like him, in hundreds of different product and business categories but all marketing "how-to" information, published offline and online, delivered in training programs, in coaching programs, by one-to-one coaches, and on and on.

Many have ascension processes for their customers, so that, with coaching as an example, the same information marketer may have programs priced at $3,000, $15,000, and $30,000 a year. They have insatiable need for new and better "front-end" marketing to bring in new buyers plus even more insatiable need for "back-end" marketing to ascend their buyers, bring buyers to conferences, and otherwise monetize buyers. They also have need for content, for everything delivered to buyers that gets created "fresh" week to week, month to month.

This is but one very good kind of information-marketer client, who I’ll call "Steady Eddie."

Another is the client who only periodically, even sporadically comes out of the woodwork to create and run a big but short-term promotion, for a product or event. I have clients like this I do a project for once a year and never hear from them until the next year.

There are other types of clients, too. The information-marketing industry is huge and diverse and blossoming thanks to proliferation of new media yet very much reliant on old media as well, and most importantly, in constant need for more copywriters and writers willing to learn how they operate, why their customers buy, what they sell, and then serve their needs.

Any such client’s successful campaign for something automatically births an endless series of Next’s, creating an endless series of assignments for the capable copywriter.

This is very important to understand. Like most businesses, a typical information-marketing business has, as its floor, one or several on-going, chug-chug-chug means of getting customers and making sales that get little or no tinkering for months or even years on end.

The client I spoke about at the start of this article is heavily reliant on a single direct-mail campaign I wrote 26 months ago, that has not needed change since.

But, good news about these information-marketing businesses: they are a bit like movie studios, in that they are very much about their next "release" and the marketing to make it a hit, and their next "release" and the marketing to make it a hit.

To their own lists of customers and unconverted leads, in their own media like websites and newsletters, they are rolling out one entirely new, built-from-scratch promotion after another after another all year long; as one is happening, the next is being readied, and the next to follow it is being conceptualized. A few months ago, when we saw the marketing of The Green Lantern movie, with fast food company, toy, comic book and magazine, video game, and online promotion. What we don’t see is all the work in progress for the marketing for the new Superman, the Flash, Wonder Woman, and Justice League of America films to follow, each in varying degrees of planning and development, for 2012, 2013, and 2014.

These information marketers work in much the same way, so there is also more than one to many new products, events, coaching programs, and services being readied for launch, and advertising, marketing, and promotion campaigns as well as content being written, on cycles of months to six months to even further out.

Few other industries or types of clients function like this. That’s why learning to write for information marketers can be so beneficial to the freelancer. Here, not only is there an abundance of available clients and opportunities and assignments, there is a way to eliminate the roller-coaster effect of getting an assignment and making money, but then being unemployed and having no income when you finish that assignment, then hunting for another gig. Here, there is a way to lock in steady work and income through a series of Next’s.

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