It may be that you don’t have a product to sell – yet!
Remember, though, I am recommending an Information Product, but who am I to say? You could sell anything you like! The process is similar to what I am slowly describing-by-doing here.
But, you may have no idea what you want to sell yet … or even know where to start …
… well, BeBiz recommends that you start by identifying some areas of interest that you have (e.g. dogs; sewing; mountain bikes) and then narrowing down to one.
I chose money-related topics (money, finance, wealth, millionaire) … you might choose ’sewing’; it’s whatever turns you on … really!
You need to be passionate about what you write (hopefully, my passion for teaching about how to make money comes through in my blogs and will come through in the test sales site that I’m creating in front of your very eyes).
If you don’t want to use a tool like BeBiz to help you with this (it costs $49.00 per month – other web-building products can cost a tenth of that!) then the stock investing book [really!] Rule # 1 Investing, by Phil Town, has a great process in the early chapters that it recommends that you use to select types of stocks that you would want to buy …
… a process that I would recommend that you can also use to find your online niche!
But, I’m using BeBiz …
It then asks you to do all sorts of cool things in order to come up with a keyword list – see an example above [AJC: what the hell is 'venal'?!]
You could probably do much of this with the various ‘free’ tools out there – for example Google’s free keyword generating tool – some of which you can access through setting up a Google Adwords account (so don’t feel obligated to buy a ‘convenience tool’ like BeBiz if you have more sense than money … unlike me!).
So, after a surprisingly short period of time (I did all of the above in an hour or two) … I am at the stage of pricing my keywords (not sure why yet … the BeBiz tutorial video on that subject refused to load) ….
Exciting, huh?
4 responses so far ↓
Jeff // September 12, 2008 at 7:51 pm |
AJ,
I’ve been playing around on the net learning about internet marketing and doing some keyword research as well.
Here are some links I have found valuable in the process that you might enjoy.
Keyword Research: I use Google itself to research my keywords.
https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal
After finding a keyword I like for my purposes, I’ll do a Google search for it with quotes. E.g. “My keyword phrase” This shows me exactly how many other web pages have this exact phrase and gives me an idea of the competition I’m facing.
Much of my research on internet marketing techniques has come from the following site:
http://www.courtneytuttle.com
I use the link below less often (I may use some of the techniques in a new “flagship” blog I have on the drawing board). It may have some good ideas to help you put your e-book to work:
http://www.entrepreneurs-journey.com/
It’s run by Yaro Starak, another Aussie, who has some interesting ideas on the e-book and making use of an email list service to deliver your content via email in a targeted and automatic fashion to subscribers.
Good Luck and keep up the great work.
-Jeff
I’m Minding My Own Business, are you minding yours?
AJC // September 12, 2008 at 9:07 pm |
@ Jeff – Thanks; I’m usually very wary of allowing links, because WordPress.com considers some spam … but, these seem worth checking out so I’ll leave them in!
Just be wary of the using a purchased e-mail list as some products like BeBiz won’t allow you to use them, for obvious reasons … SPAM, in case it’s not that obvious
They do allow – and, I recommend – you create a product or ‘gimmick’ (of real value) that encourages people who visit your site to freely GIVE you their e-mail address … this is a REAL and ethical form of opt-in list that (I am told) provides far greater results than some of these purchased mailing lists.
Also, you may be doing yourself a disservice typing in your keyword phrases in quotes (although, knowing who your 100% direct competition is, is a good thing!) … as you ALSO need to see who is popping up when the users type those words in WITHOUT quotes (as 99.9999% of people will) … I guess the best outcome is to do it with and without quotes: best of both worlds!?
Jeff // September 12, 2008 at 9:41 pm |
AJ,
I was referring to volunteer email lists. Yaro recommends giving away the e-book for free by asking users to join his email list. Once on the list he provides content directly to users email inboxes in an organized fashion using an automatic emailing service. I believe eventually he does do some targeted marketing of his other products at his email list. That may or may not be what you’re after, but it appears to work for him.
Good point about the unquoted search. I do take a peek at it to get an idea of the broader competition. If I can find a low direct competition “search” and a low competition unquoted search then I may have found a niche keyword for my content that may be worth running with.
Jeff
I’m Minding My Own Business, are you minding yours?
AJC // September 12, 2008 at 10:55 pm |
@ Jeff – Assuming that Yarro is the one providing the e-book in return for the e-mail address, then I think we are saying the same thing … if so, that’s certainly a core part of what I’m planning (and, what BeBiz encourages).
Thanks for all the info … this is good stuff!