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The Leading Education on the Web
HBB Research searched long and hard for the programs it would recommend to and use with its offline students.
The three primary criteria were:
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It must be well presented and written
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It must be created by "practioners" with a verifiable track record of outstanding success
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It must be sold at a reasonable price
Three levels of program have been selected so far.
The Core Training will be done using the Internet Marketing Center's...
"The Insider Secrets to Marketing Your Business on The Internet -- Version 2006"
This course provides a solid background of web marketing expertise, develped by people who have built a $60m business using the same techniques. At under $200, this is simply fantastic value
To learn more about it go to
Insider Secrets
The Advanced Programs will use The Reese Report "Traffic Secrets" as the primary support tool.
John Reese is a phenomenon. He is one of a small group of internet pioneers (including Ken Evoy, Perry Marshall, and Cory Rudl) who are rounded business people.
John's Traffic Secrets is not low cost - it runs at $95 per month. But the value far outweighs the cost.
Find out more about "Traffic Secrets" by getting John's Newsletter at
Traffic Secrets
Recently we have added a third program to our list as an option for our students.
It is called List & Traffic by Jimmy Brown another well-known web figure.
The program is obtained on a subscription basis, but at $10 per month it is steal.
List &Traffic |
So You'veWritten Your Book, Congratulations!!
Your own product is one of the fastest ways to web success
But you'll only get there if you can MARKET IT!!
For the leading education on the web HBB Research recommends:
Insider Secrets by Internet Marketing Center. There is a reason why it is the #1 selling course on internet maketing.
Traffic Secrets by John Reese. John is universally recognized as the top traffic guru on the web. There is simply no one better. This is the guy the other gurus go to to learn.
Join the Internet Marketing Center as an Affiliate
The Internet Marketing Center is one of the absolute leading knowledge companies on the web in the area if internet marketing. Started by the legendary Cory Rudl it was taken over by his colleague Derek Gehl and he has driven it to a $60m powerhouse.
If you believe in riding success then this is an affiliation for you. At the leat you will learn a lot!
Freedom List
Tim Brocklehurst is a former ad executve who has made the shift to the web. It didn't take him long to absorb the absolutetruth of web marketing - the money is in your customer relationships (the list).
His new offering focuses on helping you drive wealth through list creation and exploitation
Well worth a look
Links from Traffic Swarm
On each page of HBB Review we have links for business opportunities drawn from Traffic Swarm. They are there to give subscribers a chance to browse (HBB Research gets no gain from any link), and also to build our SEO position. Go to Traffic Swarm and check it out...it's a neat idea!
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The Producer Personality in Home-based Business
A Fascination with the Offering
The Producer group was the earliest on the commercial web: people or businesses of all sizes with a product of some kind already in place who wanted another channel of distribution. Indeed, the least socially acceptable of all – pornography – was one of the early drivers of the web, contributing to the sophistication of many of its tools and techniques. The Producers include complex businesses that spent years and millions of dollars learning to be successful. Today the range of goods for sale matches that in the offline world, plus some things that are unique to the web.
From the home-business point of view the range of producer options is a sub-set of the full range. Hard goods – unless you already have a small business – are difficult for a home business person to get into and, if you do, a storefront on eBay may be your best bet. Gaming tends to be the preserve of the technical or folks who are hired for the purpose. Gambling is really the preserve now of the big gambling sites. Software is a possibility, again if you are technical or you have an idea and you are willing to have someone develop it for you. However, the big opportunity (and it’s currently vast and booming) for the home-business entrepreneur is information products sold in the form of an e-Book or as an Adobe PDF.
Information Products
Background
Information products could, in theory, cover a huge range from news products, through opinion products, through to directories and the current home-business champion – ‘how-to’ products. It’s the champion because it requires no infrastructure (no newsroom), no special qualifications (university degrees) only a specific knowledge of SOMETHING – often something very narrow. Remember even if only a tiny percentage of the world is interested that can still amount to thousands or millions of people. Indeed, really narrow niches are amongst the most profitable as those in need of the information are often very keen to have it. Conversely, if you chose a narrow interest group you may need to be truly knowledgeable!!
From the ‘how-to’ information product producer’s point of view the global marketplace is a vast mosaic of tiny niches; each reflecting the interests of a definable group of people. Find an interest group, produce a product that will attract them and then promote it across the web. Of course, most people don’t do it that way. They do it backwards. They know something – e.g. how to grow champion vegetables. They write it up and then put it out there. If they are lucky the thousands of people who are interested in champion vegetables will search the web with great persistence until they find the text – whereupon they will drag out their wallets and spontaneously buy it on trust.
In the early days of the web, this was exactly what happened. And it still can. But that approach is now the preserve of the naïve and the lucky who are looking to capitalize with minimal effort on a single idea. The professionals in information products take a much more aggressive stance.
What it takes to be Successful
The Process
If you are a professional information product producer there is a series of steps you’ll have to go through to be successful.
- Research potential market niches: no leaving it to chance, actively go out and seek the market by aggressive research. This can include lurking on forums and searching different chat rooms to find out what’s hot.
- Develop the product and put it into downloadable form. The most effective format is an Adobe PDF as Adobe Reader are pretty-much universally available. If you don’t have your own PDF Creator software Adobe will do it for you online.
- Create a web-site to sell it through with downloading capability. This can range from a daunting experience at great cost to something relatively simple. A lot depends on the selection of any supplier and on the software you use. This site is built in XsitePro, along with its competitor Site Build It they are about the best on the web for the non-technical person.
- Develop the promotional texts on the site to sell it to potential visitors/buyers. Writing promotional text is a skill in its own right. But you can cheat! Do a survey of the best web site letters you have seen on the web and you will find a certain similarity. Select the ones that appeal to you and use them as a template. Alternatively e-marketing books like Rich Jerk have recommended approaches.
- Set up payment processing that allows them to buy and receive any refunds associated with your guarantee. If you join a provider like Yahoo or the XsitePro recommended provider, most of these are available as plug-ins to your site for a small monthly fee.
- Develop and undertake a promotional program that will bring people (or more accurately the kind of people who are real potential buyers) to your site – using an ever-widening array of tools and techniques. For the ways of doing this see the Marketer Section.
- Measure performance in all aspects of the process and undertake tweaking of methods. Again a sophisticated host will have tools but you may also look at.
- Cycle on to the next product, either a new one for a new market or a product extension of the ones you have or products that cross-sell or up-sell your customer base. This last point is really important. Your first product gives you a customer base and it’s always easier to feed existing customers than to find new ones.
The process is quite demanding, if you do all of it. Of course, in the present state of sophistication of the web, outsourcing has arrived. You can now get third parties to do each part of the process or even do multiple parts. In theory you could be in this business as a ‘publisher’ having the entire grunt work done by others. Indeed, there are people on the web who do just that. See our list of Recommended Resources.
Critical Success Factors
These are CSFs for the professional information provider:
- The product must add value. This is clearly critical, if you put out things that have no value you may make some money (even with a guarantee) but you’ll not prosper. This doesn’t mean you have to hit a home run every time. You can put products out there for ‘testing’, get feedback and you can continually upgrade the ones you have.
- The mechanics of buying must be smooth. Nothing cuts off sales faster than giving the buyer a chance to ‘think’ caused by a glitch in (say) the payments processing. You need the processing infrastructure – either creating your own through a ‘merchant account’ with a credit card institution or by ‘renting’ processing from a third party provider like PayPal. Once they have bought there is a 70%+ chance they will not return it even if they are totally dissatisfied.
- Your web site has to be attractive and encourage sales. This does not mean it has to be sexy. But it must not get in the way.
- Your online sales pitch must draw the audience. They typically will spend a few seconds (30 it’s said, but frankly I think that is far too high it’s more like a couple of seconds) deciding whether it’s worth reading further. Writing sales text is a real skill. You can cut and paste from other sites to get the template but time spent here is crucial.
- You need traffic. If no one comes you’ll make no sales. Simple. The web is now hyper-crowded with hucksters of all kinds. Getting through the noise will make the difference between that six-figure income and the 90% of failures. You can create traffic of your own using a vast array of tools from search engines to email campaigns using your opt-in mailing list. Or you can buy traffic from lead companies or through affiliate programs.
- You must measure your progress. What gets measured gets attended to. Sail on in ignorance of how well you are performing and you’ll leave your dreams on the table.
Concluding Remarks
Information Products are currently a mass vehicle for making money on the web. However, the first signs of concentration and professionalisation are appearing. People are setting up to publish. Amazon and others are moving into distribution. Lulu, and other instant print operations, are becoming a supplier base and are themselves bringing together the graphic arts and layout consultants. Lulu (founded by Bob Young, who was also the co-founder of Red Hat, the world's leading open source company) may become to instant printing what Google and eBay were to their industries; a galvanic force. There will always be room for the individual but professionalism is coming. Get in now.
Go to Next Article The Consultants
Load the Dice in Your Favor
SiteBuildIt
Offline, put your business where people crowd by... and you're all set. Get your cash register ready! It's all about "location, location, location."
Online, the fundamental reality of how people use the Web is different. No one "passes by." They search for "information, information, information."
And they have to find it!!
Set yourself up to win from the start with
SiteBuildIt |
Warning!
If you arrived at this site through a search engine, you need to know where you are. You have landed on a subscriber page for HBB Research's Insights Letter or of the HBB Review.
HBB Research is one of the first research programs into web home business linked to a business school.
The Insights Letter and the HBB Review are FREE newsletters that provide ideas and insights to mostly new web entrepreneurs
Subscribe to "The Insights Letter" Now!!
Sign up for HBB Research's FREE "Insights Letter" and receive a long series of FREE insights into the coming boom on web home-based business plus your FREE subscription to HBB Review. No obligation
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Top Clickbank Sellers on Traffic
Type the word WRITING, EBOOKS, and EZINES into the search box below and find the best selling books and tools on traffic sold through Clickbank:
For those of you who are not aware, Clickbank is the web's leading supplier of digital products and is an enormously powerful affiliate engine. If you join nothing else, seriously consider becoming an affiliate of Clickbank.
To find out more
CLICK HERE
If you have a digital product, CLICKBANK is the place to sell it with over 100,000 affiliates and a strong administrative system to deal with returns.
Can't Write Enough Yourself or Want Extra Books for your site?
eBook Wholesaler
The brainchild of Tom Hua this is a membership site requiring regular subscriptions. The basis of the site is the resale of e-books (currently 135 in stock.) the site does not provide a single or customizable central web site, but you do get a mini-site for each ebook. Additionally, the e-books can be personalized with your address, codes and favorite affiliations so that each book becomes a vehicle for selling memberships in the eBook Wholesaler site and other products you may have.
To check out eBook Wholesaler
EBookWholesaler
The Viral Profits Warehouse ™
Viral Profits is membership site and an excellent example of this kind of pre-packaged offering. Created by Charles & Susan Truett, ViralProfits.com provides not only a continuing stream of digital offerings (books, audio, software, tools and more) but a full selling platform as well.
For those who don’t want to develop their own web site, Viral Profits comes with full web site with built in lead capture and list building capabilities.
They also provide marketing tools: autoresponders, ad trackers, scripts, banners and texts, email texts, landing pages for products, even opt-in email leads as well as training tutorials and forums.
Tacked onto Viral Profits is a residual profits opportunity based on bringing people into the site and getting them to sign up as members.
This is a good example of the evolved pre-packed opportunity.
How to Write A Book On Anything in 14 Days... Guaranteed!
Most of us are horrified yet fascinated by the idea of writing a book. It brings up images of starving authors wrestling with the 'great American novel'. Those who have tried it are haunted by fears of writer's block and missed deadlines. Chances are you would love to do it, but cannot raise the nerve. Well imagine writing a book in 14-Days - guaranteed! This is the approach set out by Steve Manning a man with hundreds of successful writing projects behind him. Steve has perfected a technique for structuring the book, then writing it "as if you were simply telling someone about it". His amalgam of writing techniques works - for books and shorter pieces.
And his system works, we have used it for professional documents and to help structure our own book writing efforts. Like anything else, his system provides structure and discipline into what can easily become a self-indulgent exercise.
Steve has 3 levels of offering each providing a different degree of handholding
Price at time of writing:
How to write a Book on Anything in 14 Days...Guaranteed! $297.00
Write a Book now Completion Kit $248.00
Write Your Book Fast (downloadable e-book) $49.95
For more information go to WriteABookNow
'How to Write and Publish your own eBook...in as little as 7 Days'
Highly experienced authors, Jim Edwards & Joe Vitale take you through the entire writing and online publishing process - even when writing on a subject you hate! Between them they have sold literally hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of e-books and information products online, and they lay the writing process out in detail.
Price at time of writing: $29. It is due to rise to $49 at some point - but that may only be a come-on.
For more information go to The 7-Day E-book
Also worth checking out:
Special Report Bible
30-Minute Article Writing System
Lulu Book Publishing System |
