SuperTips Ezine: Issue 07
IN THIS ISSUE
2. Feature Article "Making Money From What
You Know"
3. More "Super" Tips 4. Publications of Interest 5. Readers Forum 6. Next Issue
1. Greetings! Hello folks, In last week's issue we had lots of traffic building tips but many of you may still be wondering 'What product can I provide at my web site ?' In today's main article Paulette Ensign will show you that the answer is right on your doorstep. And following that I'll give you some ideas that you can use right now. We'll also see where to get answers to your questions about online marketing and how to start up your own newsletter. Regards, Harvey
2. Feature Article "Making Money From What
You Know" Everyone has something they want the world to know about. An informational tips booklet is just one of many ways to circulate that information. From there, that content can be recycled over and over and over again into other saleable formats, all without ever writing another new word of copy. In the early 1990's when the US economy was in dismal shape, so was the economy of Organizing Solutions, Inc., a speaking and consulting company. On a 'zero budget' (translation: flat broke!), a tips booklet called, "110 Ideas for Organizing Your Business Life" was produced. Little did anyone know that was the beginning of a journey of selling over 400,000 copies in two languages without spending a penny on advertising to do it. It actually spurred an entire new business in the process. The booklet contents came from things that were said to clients or to audiences over a period of eight years, all about getting organized. It was information people wanted to know, and information that was absorbed well in small amounts. To accomplish these sales results, a variety of marketing methods were used. The first was sending a copy of the booklet to national publications, inviting them to excerpt from the booklet, and adding a tag line at the bottom inviting the reader to send a small amount of money for their own complete copy. Approximately 15,000 single copies were sold that way. Next, major corporations were contacted to sell them large quantities of the booklet, usually for their own promotional purposes, at large quantity pricing discounts. About 50,000 copies were sold this way. Then things started really expanding. Non-exclusive rights to reprint several hundred thousand copies were sold to a mail order catalog company. At the same time, a connection was made online with a marketing company in Italy, who licensed the contents to create an Italian version of the booklet. Over 100,000 copies of the Italian version were sold to a magazine who bundled it with one issue of their own publication as a gift to their subscribers. The booklet contents have also been licensed into several other languages and other physical formats. At one point, a well known American public seminar company expressed interest in producing an audio program based on the booklet. The audio set has sold many copies unto itself. That audio program also triggered a 20-minute interview on the in-flight audio programming of a major airline for two months, world-wide. Two companies who each produce laminated guides also licensed the non-exclusive rights to the contents. They then produced the product and pay royalties for all units they sell. There are still many ways to utilize the tips that were written just once. They can show up as calendars, coffee mugs, tee-shirts and any advertising speciality you can think of. They can be licensed to a company as part of a radio, television or print campaign, under the banner of "An organizing moment brought to you by.........(the name of the sponsoring company)." They could be made into an embroidery design, a poster, a board game, CD, video, and truly endless other products and applications. You most likely already have copy from which to draw. Have you ever written an article, given a speech or workshop, had an article written about you, written a book or special report, done an audio or video? All those formats can be transformed into informational, bulleted tip format. By recycling your contents, you will develop products at different price points and in different formats, thereby always having a 'yes' answer when someone wants some of what you've got. You will also be responding to the range of learning styles of the general population. Having your information in print, audio, video, small type, larger type, with graphics, without graphics -- all means you are broadening your appeal to a wider audience. The cost for developing products described in this article can range from zero to a substantial amount, and everything in between! Whenever possible, have the products developed on someone else's budget by licensing your contents to them. You may need to produce a small amount of finished product first, just for the sake of distributing some well-perceived samples. A decision maker will sometimes decide merely from reviewing a printed or electronic manuscript of your tips. Regardless of the deals you make with others, be sure to always keep the copyright in your own possession so you can continue recycling the material without anyone else's limitation. So, what do you already know a lot about that you want to share with the rest of the world? What do you already have that can be recycled? You are sitting on a gold mine. Your new products can serve as new profit centers, as marketing tools for your current business, or both. Go out and get started TODAY!
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Email: <mailto:booklets@compuserve.com>
3. More "Super" Tips 3.1 Write your own article.. today
In Paulette's article she suggested that you could draw on information
that you already know and that Here's a way to try this out:
As a subscriber to the 'Top7 Business Daily Ezine List'
(join-top7business@sparklist.com) I receive each day a short list such as I'm sure that anyone is capable of putting together a similar useful list of something that they know. The Ezine welcomes contributions so why not give it a try ? Put your resource box at the end of your submission and hey presto - you have found yet one more way of getting traffic to your site. In order to practise what I preach I submitted my Top 7 list article a few days ago. I'm waiting to see if it will be published. I've included it in the next section - and it ties in very nicely with the question later on in the Readers Forum.
3.2 Top 7 Tips for Ezine publishers 1. Don't try to handle list management yourself. Use a professional service (some are free) to process subscribes, unsubscribes, bounced mail, address changes, etc 2. Good style and layout are crucial. Regardless of the content your readers won't bother to struggle with huge blocks of text spanning the width of the screen, with no paragraphs, no breaks, no indenting. 3. Provide an archive of previous issues with an index of the contents. 4. Exchange ads for your ezine with other publishers and suggest that you review each other's ads to see how they can be improved. 5. Make it very simple to subscribe both at your website and by Email. 6. Provide a welcome message for new joiners, repeating the key mission of your ezine and offering a free gift. 7. Stop those unsubscribes: at the end of each issue provide a tantalising glimpse of what to expect in the next issue.
3.3 How to promote your site off-line When we are Emailing, Surfing, Ezineing (if there is such a word) we tend to forget there is a world outside of the Net which is a huge potential source of customers. Now how would you get these offline customers to visit your web site ? Obviously you need to get your Url in front of them together with a way of making your site really stand out amongst the others. This was the thinking that led to the creation of Web cards. These are similar to colourful postcards: they include your Url combined with a high quality, full-colour picture of your web site - or any other picture or design you wish. There is no limit to how you can use them, for example:
Send WebCards to all your customers To really appreciate the appeal of Web Cards you need to see them for real: that's why the promoters are happy to give away FREE SAMPLES. Visit here There's no obligation and it's worth getting them if only to feed you with more ideas to use in the quest for getting the word out about your product. Just to stimulate your thinking, here are 50 ways that different businesses use Web Cards. You may be one of them.
Accountants use Web Cards to remind clients of tax law changes
Banks use Web Cards to tell depositors about services available on line.
Churches use Web Cards to promote their new on-line newsletters
Design Studios create beautiful examples of their latest work on Web
Cards
Flag Football League uses Web Cards to mail it's schedule to members
High School Reunion Committees use Web Cards to announce events
Internet Registration Services use Web Cards to give out at trade shows
Neckware companies use Web Cards to promote new designs to buyers
Realtors use Web Cards to announce their Web Site to prospects Get your Free samples of Web Cards here.
4. Publications of Interest
If you need advice about any aspect of Internet Marketing you can submit
your question to ANSWERS run by Kim Skinner. Her motto is:
I have had my own questions answered by Kim and, in addition, I always
pick up useful tips from the other submissions. And now, continuing our weekly selection of newsletters which offer useful free information: Partenon Free Weekly Business Newsletter via <subscribe@partenon.com>. Here you'll discover business success tips, free offers, and business building resources to help you profit -online and off. New Subscribers get a FREE 5-line ad and a FREE E-Book!
5. Readers Forum
From Liam Graham OK Liam, first of all I'll point you to the first of the Top 7 tips above. You have a choice of paying for an automated service to handle the management of your list or use a free one. The 'downside' of a free one is that they include their sponsored advert in your newsletter. Also, it is argued, the service you receive is not as good as one you pay for.
My suggestion would be to start first with a free service. There are only
two things you need to be concerned with
I use the free service at http://www.onelist.com I've not had any problems is sending out my newsletter - I include several of my other Email addresses in my subscriber list to check that they receive them and also that there is no problem with the format using different Email reading systems. I receive notice of all subscriptions and I can also download the list of subscribers at any time. And I don't think that the sponsored ad at the end of this newsletter has caused a mass desertion of subscribers. The great advantage of this free list service is that you can have as many lists as you wish. So I first started with a dummy list to get the hang of setting up joining instructions, welcoming messages, sending out the newsletter, checking the output at different Email addresses. You don't want to risk messing any of this up once you start for real. Here's a tip: Suppose you do decide to move to another list management service. How do you resolve the problem that you may have many adverts, articles, directory entries sitting around on the Net pointing to that service eg http://www.onelist.com/subscribe/supertips
The answer is to avoid the problem in the first place. Getting the word out about your new newsletter is a subject of it's own which we will cover later but a good place to start is a submission to the New List at <http://scout.cs.wisc.edu/scout/new-list/> It's worthwhile subscribing to that list just to see the fascinating variation of topics on which people are starting newsletters or discussion lists. Now for your concern that you may run out of material. I can assure you that once you get started you will constantly be thinking of new ideas. Jot them down in a file for future use and watch them build. I set myself a deadline that my Wednesday issue must be ready by Sunday - no excuses. Setting goals like this can work wonders. But here's a way around the problem of writing your own material. If the 'Top7 Business Daily Ezine List' mentioned above can publish each day then they must have plenty of material in stock to do this. I have seen original articles from the publisher but most of it is from outside contributors, like you and I. So on a similar principle if you can think of a suitable topic for a newsletter and get others to contribute, which they will be pleased to do for the publicity, then it sounds like you'll be on to a winner.
6. Next Issue If you have your own article or tip please feel free to contribute it, with your bio information, and you will receive full credit if it gets published. But you don't know how to write a good article ? Well in next week's issue Chris Ayers will tell us about "Getting Your Articles Published On The Web - How to Increase Your Chances by 300%" Also if you have any suggestions to improve this newsletter so that we can make it a great resource for all our readers please drop me a line. Thanks, Harvey
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