Infoproducts: Price High Or Low? What Has Worked Best For Me

November 4, 2011 By Leave a Comment

I created my first infoproduct, an ebook showing people step by step how to use Twitter for business, in 2009. I was completely new to the world of infoproducts, and had no idea how to price my product. I was fortunate enough to be chatting with several very successful internet marketers, so I hit them up for advice.  These are people who make in the six figures every year selling software and infoproducts, and they are very deliberate in everything they do, including their pricing strategy.  So here was the advice that I got: Price low – seven bucks or less! And – price high – create a big product and charge several hundred dollars or more! And the frustrating thing was – the people who were giving me this very different advice were telling me what had worked for THEM, but what worked for each person was very different.

Arguments for pricing low: this economy is terrible, people are spending less, and if you price low many more people will buy your product. And if they like your product, they will recommend it to friends and they will buy your next product, too. People are less likely to rip off low priced products, and less likely to ask for refunds, so it’s less hassle. And if you price low, for a great product, people will perceive you as providing fantastic value and over-delivering.  When you price low enough, you increase the chances that people will buy on impulse rather than thinking about it and meaning to come back to buy later, but never doing so…

Arguments for pricing high: Once you price low, it’s hard to convince people to ever pay high for your products. People may perceive low price as low value. You have to sell many more products at a low price then you do at a high price. If you price low, you will not be able to find affiliates who want to promote your products for you because the cut they get from the product will be tiny.  If you price low, all of the customers you get will be cheapskates who will never buy more expensive products.

I ended up pricing low, and sold thousands of copies of my ebook at $7, and literally had half a dozen refunds. The reaction to the ebook was amazingly positive, I got tons of nice comments, and

But some very successful marketers were telling me that I was waaaay underpricing my ebook and I really needed to start charging more. So I created a new infoproduct and charged $19, and I collaborated with some marketers on products that were even more expensive.

And it didn’t work out that well. Way less sales.  I mean, hundreds of sales versus thousands. Way less comments about how wonderful the product is.

This doesn’t mean that it’s wrong to create high priced products; it just means that you have to experiment, try different methods, and go with what works best for YOU. You also need to look at the market, see what other people are charging for similar products, and frankly…charge less.

I am working on some future products which will be released in the near future, and I will be pricing them low this time around.

 

Filed Under: Blog, Blogging For Business, Make Money Online

Why You’re Not Getting Paid Enough For Your Writing…And What To Do About It

October 12, 2011 By Leave a Comment

In a recent blog post, I suggested that one way to make a little quick cash, if you’re a good writer, is to write articles.

But I also emphasized the “little” aspect of it.  Unless you luck into writing articles for a really wonderful client, you will not find many people willing to pay well for articles. Why? Two reasons:

1.) Supply and demand.  Not only has this economy flooded the market with people desperate to make an extra buck – many of them people who formerly worked as journalists or teachers, so they know how to write – but thanks to the internet, you are competing against people from developing countries who may charge as little as $1 an article.

2.) Many people are seeking affordable articles, not quality articles. A lot of people who seek article writers want to fill up blogs or websites with content, any content, as long as that content is stuffed with keywords. They want to use those articles to make money from adsense or other programs, or they want to use the articles for SEO purposes.  They aren’t using the articles to build up their personal brand, so they don’t care less about whether the articles are well written or not; they make their profit by buying content in bulk, basically. It can be really challenging to find people willing to pay more than $5 to write an article or blog post.  Which is ridiculous money and not worth the effort.

If you’re trying to make a living writing articles, and you are a good writer…I can just about guarantee that you’re not being paid what you’re worth.

So you should just give up, right? Find some other way to make money?

Well, no. I have used my writing skills to build up a solid online business. I know plenty of people who have done the same. It can be done.

Here are some tips to help you do the same:

  • Write a few articles cheaply to get testimonials about your writing skills – and then move on! Writing articles full time is no way to earn a living wage these days.
  • Write content that pays well. People pay more for: press releases, ebooks, ghostwriting, memoirs, white papers.
  • Use your content to fill up your website and get people to come to your website, by giving away useful information. Then, when you have decent traffic, put adsense, affiliate ads, and banner ads on your site.
  • Create info products about what you know and sell multiple short ebooks.
  • Always use your writing to generate multiple streams of income. You will have busy months in some areas, and slow months in some areas. Ebooks will be selling well one month, and not the next month.  Your affiliate sales will be ebb and flow.

And now, the shameless self promotion part of this blog post.  Dawn Abraham is a copywriting genius who’s written articles that generated as much as $9000 in adsense income. That’s more money than most published authors make these days.

And when it comes to finding ways to make money from my writing, I’m not too shabby , if I do say so myself. We are teaming up to teach a teleclass which will take you step by step through how write articles that generate multiple streams of income.  And I guarantee you this: If you pay attention in class, and follow the blueprint we lay out for you – you WILL make money with your writing!   https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=166403983447910

Filed Under: Blog, Blogging For Business, Productivity Tips

Build Your Social Media Audience: The First Steps

September 23, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Some people may argue that it doesn’t matter how big your following is on the various social media sites, that it’s all a big ego exercise, that a big following is meaningless these days when you can get bots to build your audience, etc. etc.

Here’s what I know, from years of experience in internet marketing and promoting myself and my clients online: Yes, getting a big audience won’t help you if you have nothing decent to sell or promote.  Yes, a big audience is meaningless if you don’t know how to interact with them.  However, assuming that you have quality products or services, and that you know how to communicate with your audience in a helpful, sociable, non-salesy way (more on that in a future post), then having a big social media audience is crucial. Why? Two main reasons:  Because it offers visible social proof of your success. And because the more people that follow you, the more potential customers you have.

The reason that I got my other website, www.thepressreleasesite.com, to rank no. 1 for the term “press release writer” against 12 million competing sites, and the reason that I get thousands of visitors to that site that I very rarely update, is because of my large social media following. I get new inquiries every week from customers because of that social media following, and because of the good content I have on my site (she says humbly).

So you’re convinced? You’re ready to rush out and start finding lots of friends, followers, and connections?

Not so fast! First, there are some crucial first steps you need to take.

1.) Make sure that your website is ready for prime time.  There’s no point in sending people to a website that is half finished, that is riddled with typos, or that has broken links.

Go over it with a critical eye. Is the design attractive, clean, and easy to navigate? Is every link working?  Is there a clear “call to action” on the home page, and every other page, if you want people to take a particular action? Is it easy to sign up for your newsletter, or find the tab with your products and services? Do you have a “contact me” section with current contact info?

2.) Have a blog on your website that is filled with well written posts which demonstrate your expertise. This is crucial for both SEO purposes and credibility purposes.  If you sell exercise videos, feature some short clips from those videos and have blog posts about how to build big biceps, or how to firm up one’s stomach after having a baby, or whatever your focus is. If you sell eco friendly gardening products, have blog posts about natural pesticides, and gardening calenders, and how to make natural fertilizer. You get the idea.

3.) Ensure that your social media accounts look professional. You should get a custom twitter background – they’re generally not more than $100. If you have a Facebook business page, you should get that custom-designed as well.  My friends at www.savvygiraffe.com (not an affiliate link – I just recommend them because they’re good!) have Twitter/Facebook design packages, as do many other designers.

You should ensure that your bio is up to date and describes what you do, and that your contact information is up to date as well.

Now you’re ready to get out there and start building up your audience!

Filed Under: Blog, Blogging For Business, Make Money Online, Social Media Marketing

How Do You Measure ROI On Your Social Media Marketing Campaigns?

August 20, 2011 By Leave a Comment

One of the things that I love about marketing via social media is how easy it is to see results.

And I always advise that my clients monitor their social media marketing campaigns, so they can tweak and adjust as necessary. Testing and tracking, baby. It’s all about the testing and tracking.

Here are some of the ways that I do it:

I use Tweetbeep and Google Alerts, to see when my name is mentioned. Among other things, when I tweet a link to a new blog post on my other website, www.thepressreleasesite.com, Tweetbeep lets me know every time someone retweets (as long as they give me credit.) This tells me how effective I am in spreading my message, and which types of posts are best-received.

I also have Google analytics installed on my blog so I know where all of my traffic is coming from. This tells me which social media platforms work best for me, and which ones are a waste of time. At this point, I get most of my traffic from Twitter, then I also get a lot from the Warrior Forum – www.warriorforum.com, and I get some from Facebook and Linked in, and the rest from organic search.

I often use bit.ly or http://cli.gs/ as a link shrinking tool. These tools allow me to see how many people clicked on a link that I post in my tweet.

I also search for my name on www.addictomatic.com, technorati.com, socialmention.com, and other tools – and I search for competitors names as well.

These are just a few of the many – free – ways that I keep track of how well I’m doing with my marketing efforts. What are your favorites – free or paid? What am I missing?

Filed Under: Blog

7 Takeways From My First Webinar

April 23, 2009 By Leave a Comment

I gave a webinar for PRWeb today – THANKS, Jiyan Wei, Nida, Kate, and all you awesome people, for inviting me!

Things I learned from giving my first webinar:

1.) I got Keynotes, a slideshow program for Mac, I learned how to do fancy builds and all kinds of dazzling special effects…I needn’t have bothered. When I started checking around before doing this webinar, all the experts told me that special effects on slideshows are generally distracting and they slow down the slideshows for a lot of people.

2.) Always do a dry run several days before your webinar so if there are glitches you have plenty of time to fix them.

3.) Plan for every possible emergency. I took my dogs to the vet for the day so they wouldn’t bark in the background – yes I work from home! – and I had my charged up cell phone standing by in case my home phone battery died and I printed out my presentation in case my computer crashed.

4.) Use pictures from istockphoto to illustrate your slides. $1 each. Can’t beat that. Also Fotolia, Getty Images, Corbis, etc. – stock photos give a very professional touch.

5.) There’s free pie chart software on the web – pie charts are the awesomeness. http://nces.ed.gov/nceskids/createAgraph/default.aspx – That’s a good one.

6.) For branding purposes get someone to make a colored bar with your business name to go across the top of your webinar slides, and your website’s URL.

7.) Lists of bullet points are your friend, but break it up with some some slides with color.

Filed Under: Blog