What a Seventeenth Century Frenchman Can Teach Us About Business
Hello again
Isn't it odd how one thing leads to another? Or, how something totally unrelated can give you insight into a problem that was already on your mind - producing a solution from a direction you never expected?
While it's great to find a solution in an unlikely place, it's also good to have something confirmed by an unlikely source. Even from seventeenth century France.
One of the best ways to quickly build a business is through arranging joint ventures with people who have the ingredient you currently lack. That might be a product that you can sell to your list or to a market you have access to, or it can be the market for a product you already have.
But why should anyone help you?
Well, by and large, successful people are incredibly generous if you ask for help. But there is a limit, not least to their time, so they can't possibly help everyone who asks. And they are in business, and the first thing a business person asks, when they have their business hat on, is 'What's in it for me?' In fact, that's the first thing your customers ask, as well, so selling a joint venture proposition to a potential partner is very similar to selling a product to a customer.
That Frenchman, Jean de La Bruyere (1645-1696) had this to say:
'The shortest and best way to make your fortune is to let people see clearly that it is in their interests to promote yours.'
Promoting their interests, in our case, means helping to build their business and their fortune. (For the general public, their interests may be something other than business or finance, like relieving their pain, for example.) But now your 'market' is much smaller, so you need your success rate to be much higher. Which means you have to be very clear exactly what's in it for them and make sure it's something very good!
For most new businesses, finding customers is the major issue. For an online marketer, those customers are probably already in someone's list. Your job, then, is to persuade the list owner that it's in their interests to promote your product.
Not just that it's a great product.
Not just that you're a great person.
Not just that you need the money!
But, that it's in their interests. More than that, they'll want to see some evidence that the product sells well and easily, has few returns and will enhance their reputation if they promote it. They may not have time to evaluate the product for themselves, or to create the sales copy.
So, if you have a product you'd like to promote through one or more joint ventures, you need to be able to show them results from your marketing efforts.
You'll need a sales page that converts visitors into customers - before you approach potential partners. Test this by driving traffic to it using Adsense, MSN Live or similar, as well as free methods like blogs, forums and social networking sites. Then your list owner knows they'll get decent sales when they send their customers there. Two percent conversion is quite reasonable for untargeted traffic, ten times that is desirable for pre-qualified visitors.
Be able to show few if any returns, and most of all, show them they'll make good money! You'll usually have to offer at least 50% commission to a jv partner, more to a top marketer.
Your product must be a good 'fit' with their list, and it must offer something new or unique or offer it in a new and better way.
Put those things in place, though, and you've a much better chance of convincing someone your product is worth promoting.
Getting the attention of your potential partner is another matter. I'll cover that next time!
Roy Everitt, Writing For Results
Friday, 30 November 2007
Tuesday, 27 November 2007
I Know, I Know...
Why the Best Information is More Than Just Learned.
Hello again.
No, I'm not trying to be smug, but there I some things I've learned and there are some things I know. The same will be true for you, too.
The difference is this: the things we learn, are things we've learned to be true, with a pretty high degree of confidence, whereas the things we know are those things we've actually experienced in the real world.
Just as a man can never know how it feels to give birth, however much he reads about it and however empathetic and sensitive he is, so you and I can never really know the things we read about but don't experience for ourselves.
And when it comes to transmitting that knowledge to other people, the difference can be hard to hide. Somehow, real experience, whether we mention it explicitly or not, gives a real authority to a piece of information. Mere knowledge, while it may be equally comprehensive in detail and just as accurate, can often lack that authority.
So it is with information products. The feeling may be hard to pin down, but sometimes we know that a product lacks authority, even though it's superficially impressive (and accurate, valid and useful). We can't always put our finger on just why that is, but it's there nonetheless.
So, when you're creating an information product, it's not always enough to have devoured every bit of information you could get your hands on, if you haven't actually used that information in real life. That's why we can all write and speak with greater authority on subjects we've been involved in for years - it's real knowledge, not learning.
Can you turn some of your real, hard-won knowledge into a genuine, authoritative information product? Will that be more valuable, thanks to your authority, than an apparently more valuable piece of learned information?
It's worth thinking about. Knowledge is power, but real knowledge is power with real authority.
Roy Everitt, Writing for Results
PS. Some of the most successful information products are actually produced very quickly, by people with the wit and foresight to learn all about the latest software, for example, by testing and trying it out, then writing or speaking about it. Often, these users' guides and how-to's become an essential must-buy or bonus item for anyone buying the original product.
You can see these in book stores - the 'for Dummies' books are excellent examples, but they are still book shop books, with the inevitable publishing, printing and distribution delays. Online, the equivalent ebooks have been known to appear in days or even hours after the launch of a product.
Hello again.
No, I'm not trying to be smug, but there I some things I've learned and there are some things I know. The same will be true for you, too.
The difference is this: the things we learn, are things we've learned to be true, with a pretty high degree of confidence, whereas the things we know are those things we've actually experienced in the real world.
Just as a man can never know how it feels to give birth, however much he reads about it and however empathetic and sensitive he is, so you and I can never really know the things we read about but don't experience for ourselves.
And when it comes to transmitting that knowledge to other people, the difference can be hard to hide. Somehow, real experience, whether we mention it explicitly or not, gives a real authority to a piece of information. Mere knowledge, while it may be equally comprehensive in detail and just as accurate, can often lack that authority.
So it is with information products. The feeling may be hard to pin down, but sometimes we know that a product lacks authority, even though it's superficially impressive (and accurate, valid and useful). We can't always put our finger on just why that is, but it's there nonetheless.
So, when you're creating an information product, it's not always enough to have devoured every bit of information you could get your hands on, if you haven't actually used that information in real life. That's why we can all write and speak with greater authority on subjects we've been involved in for years - it's real knowledge, not learning.
Can you turn some of your real, hard-won knowledge into a genuine, authoritative information product? Will that be more valuable, thanks to your authority, than an apparently more valuable piece of learned information?
It's worth thinking about. Knowledge is power, but real knowledge is power with real authority.
Roy Everitt, Writing for Results
PS. Some of the most successful information products are actually produced very quickly, by people with the wit and foresight to learn all about the latest software, for example, by testing and trying it out, then writing or speaking about it. Often, these users' guides and how-to's become an essential must-buy or bonus item for anyone buying the original product.
You can see these in book stores - the 'for Dummies' books are excellent examples, but they are still book shop books, with the inevitable publishing, printing and distribution delays. Online, the equivalent ebooks have been known to appear in days or even hours after the launch of a product.
Saturday, 24 November 2007
Chris Starts a Stampede
Hello.
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned a new product I'd seen, by Chris Freville, called 'Web 2.0 Stampede' - a product I was more than happy to endorse.
Having met Chris at Robert Puddy's event at Coventry (the same one where I met both David Congreave and Alex Jeffreys - do you get the impression that was a great event?), he straight away got back in touch with a review copy of Web 2.0 Stampede.
Sometimes, 'professionally written' products are a disappointment. Some writers just can't write (yet thrive anyway), while some well-written products are devoid of good, useful content. Chris's product, on the other hand, ticked all the boxes. It was, generally, excellently written (it falls away slightly at the end, perhaps), is jam-packed with good, useful and original content, and it's set out in a way that makes it all easy to use.
So, it's hardly surprising that the Web 2.0 Stampede sale page has had thousands of hits, because I know a lot of big-name marketers were also happy to endorse the book to their lists, plus he's had a lot of complimentary comments on various forums and blogs. You'll find a link to Web 2.0 Stampede to the right of this article.
If you haven't seen it yet, get there now. Web 2.0 is not going anywhere but up. You'll be wise to go with it!
Roy Everitt, Writing for results
PS. See what all the fuss is about! Click on the blue banner ad to the right to go to Web 2.0 Stampede.
A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned a new product I'd seen, by Chris Freville, called 'Web 2.0 Stampede' - a product I was more than happy to endorse.
Having met Chris at Robert Puddy's event at Coventry (the same one where I met both David Congreave and Alex Jeffreys - do you get the impression that was a great event?), he straight away got back in touch with a review copy of Web 2.0 Stampede.
Sometimes, 'professionally written' products are a disappointment. Some writers just can't write (yet thrive anyway), while some well-written products are devoid of good, useful content. Chris's product, on the other hand, ticked all the boxes. It was, generally, excellently written (it falls away slightly at the end, perhaps), is jam-packed with good, useful and original content, and it's set out in a way that makes it all easy to use.
So, it's hardly surprising that the Web 2.0 Stampede sale page has had thousands of hits, because I know a lot of big-name marketers were also happy to endorse the book to their lists, plus he's had a lot of complimentary comments on various forums and blogs. You'll find a link to Web 2.0 Stampede to the right of this article.
If you haven't seen it yet, get there now. Web 2.0 is not going anywhere but up. You'll be wise to go with it!
Roy Everitt, Writing for results
PS. See what all the fuss is about! Click on the blue banner ad to the right to go to Web 2.0 Stampede.
Friday, 23 November 2007
Be Ahead of the Crowd
Stick With Me!
Hello, once again.
One of the major benefits of networking to the extent Jacqui and I do, especially now we're well past the 'novice' stage, is that we often get asked to help in the launch of a new product. Because, to do that, we usually have to see a pre-launch edition of whatever we're helping to launch. So we're among the first people to see the new product.
Which is an advantage in itself, because it means we can put new products into action as soon as they're released, while everyone else is still finding out about them.
It also means I can give you advance notice of the really interesting stuff, so you're ready to grab it and get in ahead of the main wave the moment it goes on sale.
Now, a few days ago I told you about David Congreave and his new product, Lucid SEO. I met David at Coventry (actually, the hotel was in Meriden), and was immediately impressed. Another whom I met there was Alex Jeffreys, who is also very definitely going places.
Alex has been in business online for almost exactly a year and had an excellent first twelve months with his first product, 'Easy Profit Auctions'. To mark that anniversary, Alex's second product will be launched very soon. Putting into place everything he's learned in his first year (including not trying to launch a product at Thanksgiving!), Alex is confident this launch is going to be even more successful than his first, and his next twelve months will be even more lucrative than the last twelve.
Not surprisingly, Alex is determined to get everything spot-on for the big day, to the extent that he hasn't even released the name of his new product. But I can tell you it's an information product designed to help anyone who reads it and takes the lessons on board, wildly successful in Internet marketing.
As soon as Alex is ready for 'proper' pre-launch, as opposed to 'pre' pre-launch, I'll be able to tell you more. Meanwhile, I get to see it first, and I can tell you it's good!
Roy Everitt, Writing For Results
PS. Getting advance copies of great new products is just one benefit of mixing with the successful and the up-and-coming. But as incidental benefits go, it's not bad. And if you're not networking, it's something else you're missing out on!
Hello, once again.
One of the major benefits of networking to the extent Jacqui and I do, especially now we're well past the 'novice' stage, is that we often get asked to help in the launch of a new product. Because, to do that, we usually have to see a pre-launch edition of whatever we're helping to launch. So we're among the first people to see the new product.
Which is an advantage in itself, because it means we can put new products into action as soon as they're released, while everyone else is still finding out about them.
It also means I can give you advance notice of the really interesting stuff, so you're ready to grab it and get in ahead of the main wave the moment it goes on sale.
Now, a few days ago I told you about David Congreave and his new product, Lucid SEO. I met David at Coventry (actually, the hotel was in Meriden), and was immediately impressed. Another whom I met there was Alex Jeffreys, who is also very definitely going places.
Alex has been in business online for almost exactly a year and had an excellent first twelve months with his first product, 'Easy Profit Auctions'. To mark that anniversary, Alex's second product will be launched very soon. Putting into place everything he's learned in his first year (including not trying to launch a product at Thanksgiving!), Alex is confident this launch is going to be even more successful than his first, and his next twelve months will be even more lucrative than the last twelve.
Not surprisingly, Alex is determined to get everything spot-on for the big day, to the extent that he hasn't even released the name of his new product. But I can tell you it's an information product designed to help anyone who reads it and takes the lessons on board, wildly successful in Internet marketing.
As soon as Alex is ready for 'proper' pre-launch, as opposed to 'pre' pre-launch, I'll be able to tell you more. Meanwhile, I get to see it first, and I can tell you it's good!
Roy Everitt, Writing For Results
PS. Getting advance copies of great new products is just one benefit of mixing with the successful and the up-and-coming. But as incidental benefits go, it's not bad. And if you're not networking, it's something else you're missing out on!
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