A product roadmap helps you figure out
where your business is going.

Great question, Amy! I’ve shared my goal about creating 10 products in 2010, but I haven’t talked much about how they all fit together…

The Problem: Infinite Opportunities

It is possible to do a nearly infinite number of things to make money online. There isn’t just one “proven path” to riches…witness the huge number of crazy inventions that make their inventors millions. (Ever had that feeling… “I could have done that! I should have done that!” Right? Me too!)

I want to do so many things. I’d love to write a book to help out people who are discovering that they have gluten intolerance or Celiac disease. I know that would be profitable. I constantly have ideas for WordPress plugins, video products, a product on great businesses to start online…

Pretty quickly, I had to learn to focus. I had to think strategically…not only about which products would make me the most money, but how those products would integrate with each other. This is the real key.

Step 1: Test With a Free Product

I started testing the market for blogging success materials by releasing my free Blog Success Manifesto. I went over the top with it as a free product. It’s 62 pages, jam-packed with practical advice on growing your blog faster than you ever have before. I could have easily charged $17-$27 for it, but I wanted the readership growth instead. (And I got it…nearly 4,000 people have downloaded their free copies!)

More importantly, the success of my free download proved there was a market that was interested in growing their blogs. I then launched my Guest Post Secrets product to serve that same market. I edited my Blog Success Manifesto to refer to Guest Post Secrets, and put a big mention about it here on my blog. Now I had two products working together, like this:

Step 2: Go Upmarket

My next step was to present a higher-ticket offer. I created my one-day workshop and offered a free webinar to my list (most of whom joined up originally because my Blog Success Manifesto.) I sold 4 out of the 5 slots right away, and the 5th one closed later. (That means my first San Diego workshop is now sold out! Hooray!)

These products worked in tandem like this:

Step 3: Fill in the Blanks

Now I wanted to create more products. Once you have a couple of paid products out the door, you can start filling in the blanks.

Part of Best Blogs will be a mailing list bloggers can sign up to, so I added that into my roadmap. Then I launched Blog Set Up as another low-price opt-in similar to Blog Success Manifesto:

My next product will be an intermediate product offering an hour with me for $497:

And then, I plan to release a product guiding people step-by-step through setting up their blog and driving traffic to it:

It’s pretty cool to see how these products fit together, isn’t it?

The key here is that once you have a buyer, you need to offer more products to that person. It’s much easier to sell something to someone who has already bought something else from you. If you don’t have the products to fill in the blanks, you should go out there and find great affiliate products that you are happy to promote, and make money that way.

Step 4: Automate

The final step in your roadmap–after you’ve launched some products–is to automate much of the cross-selling. You can do this with an email autoresponder series — something I plan to talk about in a later post. (I use Aweber as my email service, and recommend them.)

Four days after you download my Blog Success Manifesto, my email autoresponder follows up with you to make sure you got the download–and also introduces you to Guest Post Secrets. The Guest Post Secrets homepage allows you to opt in to see some high-value free videos, and over a 4-day period, gives you a special deal on buying Guest Post Secrets.

As I launch larger products, I will integrate these into my autoresponders, too. My goal is to have a defined roadmap of products to create in a “funnel” that automatically rolls people over from buying a low-ticket product like Blog Set Up or a free product like Blog Success Manifesto into buying higher-ticket items. Many of these products will be hands-off on my part, allowing for an automated income stream of thousands of dollars a month.

It is incredibly difficult to make a million dollars online selling one-off products…especially if they are inexpensive ebooks. Here’s a typical example: A person decides to make money online. They sell a dog training ebook, then the next month peddle psoriasis cures, then leap to the “make money online” niche. They now have three different lists, each with only a handful of people. And imagine trying to write content about dog training, psoriasis, AND making money online all in a few days! Forget it.

Multiple products are a good thing. But without a product roadmap, and a plan of action for seeing how they all fit together, multiple products are less than worthless. I vastly prefer becoming an expert in a few small fields and selling products in those fields only. I may pass on the next overhyped “million-dollar idea!”, but I can feel confident that every customer I gain will pay off far more than the people who simply hard-sell one or two items.

Repurposing Your Products

By the way, here’s a roadmap I’ve been developing for my next set of products:

You may see now how some of my existing products can be re-purposed for a different audience. Can your products do that? If not, you may want to consider changing your product roadmap.

Questions, or comments? What’s your product roadmap? Let me know in the comments!

Recommended Reading:

• How To Make A Mind Map. Do you ever feel completely overwhelmed by some of the projects you are working on…like you’ve set an impossible goal? Here’s a video on how to make a mind map and get all that junk out of your head…quickly and easily!
• Creating A New Product. A four-step guide to creating your first product.
• Products I Love. If you haven’t seen this yet, check it out…it’s the full list of all the products I use on a regular basis and recommend!

Blog Set Up.

If you’re new here, I write my goals publicly on my blog every year, then update regularly with new information. My biggest goal for 2010 was to create 10 products and release them. This was a challenge to myself to learn to create and release products quickly.

So far I’ve released:

1. BestBlogs.net (more on Best Blogs in a later post)
2. Guest Post Secrets
3. One-day in-person workshops

And now, my latest creation: Blog Set Up.

One way to get more customers for your products is to create more customers. Guest Post Secrets is geared toward bloggers, and I have another product (not yet released to the public)–video tutorials on how to set up your blog. What better way to sell these two products than to help people get a blog set up?

As part of an “implementation challenge” at a conference I attended, I set up Blog Set Up from scratch in about 24 hours. On Thursday, May 20, I did keyword research and eventually settled on the domain name blogsetup.us.

The site works like this: You sign up for a HostGator account through us, and we set up your blog for you for free. We get paid by HostGator to refer you as a new customer, so that’s how the site makes money.

Once we’ve set up your blog, we send you an email inviting you to opt in to our Blog Set Up email list, which contains a free helper video on how to set up a custom design for your blog (WordPress calls this a “theme”.) Then, we’ll send you some more cool content in the hope that you will purchase Guest Post Secrets or my as-yet-unreleased blog tutorial videos.

Testing Your New Product

By Friday, May 21, I was ready for my first customer. I mentioned it at the seminar I was at, and five people there signed up.

When you launch a site, you’re not going to get it right the first time. Watch others go through it–and keep quiet. Ask them to run through their thought process out loud. Note any questions they have–those are questions your site needs to address up front.

After watching two people go through the process, I redid a significant portion of the site, then launched an AdWords campaign to drive traffic to it. The AdWords campaign is getting an amazing click-through rate, but people aren’t buying, so one of my next steps is to address that.

The good news is that people who do know me are buying, and the site is just about to crest $1,000 in revenue in its first week!

I also shot two quick video testimonials from people at the seminar whose blogs I set up. I’ll add those to the site over the next few days to show some social proof. (Tip: Video testimonials work far better than text ones. Invest in a camera and record them on the spot, then edit and post them!)

Next Step: Outsource the Work

Right now, I am doing the blog setups, but one of my additional next steps is to find a capable person to outsource this to. I plan to use oDesk to find the person, then use Camtasia to shoot a how-to video with my exact process for setting up a blog, and then watch my new employee go through a setup his/herself. That way I’ll know quickly whether I’ve hired the right person.

Want to Launch a Product Fast? My Tips…

I’m proud: I was able to break through a lot of my own barriers and launch a complete website in just over 24 hours! That’s a new record for me, and makes my 10 products goal for this year much more achievable. This website should also boost my income significantly–especially if I can get the AdWords clickers to actually take action and buy a hosting package.

There was no way I could have launched Blog Set Up in 24 hours if I had to write all the HTML by hand. So, for quick implementation, I used WordPress as my content management system–even though Blog Set Up is not a “blog”.

I have to give credit to WooThemes and their amazing “Optimize” theme. It looks fantastic on Blog Set Up. Plus, I found a bug in the theme and they were able to fix it just a few hours after I posted on their forum. Optimize was well worth the investment.

Since I’ve had such great support with WooThemes, I find myself buying from them again and again. (erica.biz runs on their Fresh News theme.) I highly recommend WooThemes if you want to launch a site quickly. Check out WooThemes.

Need a blog set up? Have you been procrastinating on getting started with a blog? Take advantage of Blog Set Up today and get your blog set up by our experts!

Have questions about fast product launches, or about Blog Set Up itself? Ask ‘em in the comments and I will answer! Also, feel free to share your own product launch experiences.

P.S. Stealing this product idea would not be a good idea. Find your own product idea.

Recommended Reading:

• oDesk Review. Is outsourcing worth the effort? Here are my thoughts, plus my step-by-step guide to using oDesk to outsource labor.
• What to Do When People Aren’t Buying. Ever get the comment “I’d love to buy your product, but I just can’t afford it”? Or–how about the even more blunt “That seems expensive!” You probably don’t need to lower your price! Read this for what to do instead…
• How to Read People’s Minds… …and create the product they most desire! It would be great if we could read people’s minds. As far as I know, that product doesn’t exist, but these two methods come pretty close.

At the end of every month, I tally up all my various income sources. I noticed a hugely interesting pattern when I looked at the difference between January, February, and March:

In March, I made more than 7x the income I had just two months prior. Wow. What the heck happened?

It Wasn’t That My Blog Had More Traffic…

I can tell you the secret wasn’t more traffic or more subscribers. In January, I had 22,615 unique visitors to erica.biz. In March, I had 25,703 visits–not a substantially higher number. Same with subscribers–I had a few hundred more in March than in January, but it wasn’t substantially higher.

What was the big difference, then?

Let’s look carefully at the breakdown. I officially launched Guest Post Secrets on February 1, but 3 people found it early and bought it in January. Subtracting that out, without me launching a product, my blog made $537.19 in January.

And that’s with a good amount of traffic–over 40,000 pageviews. No wonder you hear so many bloggers complain that their blogs don’t make any money. Relying on advertising alone would have left me destitute.

Tip #1: Launch a Product

In February, I launched Guest Post Secrets. That launch brought in a significant amount of money, netting me $1801.00. Not bad for a product I can sell over and over again as new people show up on my blog.

So, for February, my blog made $2601.13–a 4x jump from January. That’s tangible proof that surveying your customers and then creating a product that helps them get something they desire is the key to making a full-time income. This is especially true if you have a blog that’s not getting millions of visitors a month.

Ah…but then what happened in March?

Tip #2: Launch a High-Ticket Product!

I didn’t sell a whole lot of Guest Post Secrets in March. I didn’t go after affiliates, and I didn’t advertise it anywhere else. (I’m working on both of those this month.) Predictably, the sales died down a bit.

Instead, I launched a high-ticket product. I promoted it via a free webinar, which I called my first “Wednesday workshop.” As a test, I sent it out only to my email list subscribers, and didn’t even post about it here.

Of my ~4,100 email list subscribers at the time, 137 signed up for the workshop, and 78 attended. I delivered a straight hour of great content, going into detail about my past and answering tons of questions from the audience. (There were over 100 questions…I couldn’t even keep up with them all!)

At the end of the hour, I delivered a pitch for my first in-person workshop–held here in San Diego in June, where I work with just five small business owners on growing their businesses.

How I Decided What to Offer

The in-person workshop came together this way for a few reasons. The biggest reason was that I receive a lot of emails asking for 1-on-1 consulting. I am not particularly interested in 1-on-1 consulting at this point in time–I prefer to work on my blog or on information products. But I thought this would be fun, and heck, if no one signed up, I’d just move on and continue working on products.

After asking for some feedback from others as to how I should set the pricing, I settled on $997.00 per person for the day–and emphasized that each person could bring a business partner for free. The $997.00 price point is realistically about half of where I want to be, but I figured this first group could give me testimonials. I plan to raise the price for the next workshop, and also take it on the road in the future.

I set up a quick sales page for the workshop. (Seriously quick…I started working on it about an hour before the webinar, and finished just in the nick of time!)

Keep in mind, I had no idea if anyone would sign up. This was scary, but I figured it was better than not trying at all. To get over my fear, I kept myself busy–I worked on the sales letter and tested my webcam setup.

A happy surprise occurred when, at the end of the webinar, 4 people signed up!

The Big “Duh” Moment: Are You Making This Mistake?

It was then that I realized what the missing piece of the puzzle was when it came to making money with my blog: I hadn’t made an offer.

Looking back, it seems almost like a “duh!” moment. Sure, I had Guest Post Secrets, and that sold a lot. But some folks who read erica.biz don’t have a blog, and others have a blog and are already guest posting to great effect.

Those who wanted consulting wanted something else: personalized advice about how to break through their own barriers. By setting my price far higher on that, I didn’t devalue my own time, and I also managed to make just under $4,000 in one 90-minute webinar.

Of course, there is another day I’ll need to spend with these folks. But that’s enjoyable time for me. I love helping people, especially in person, and the workshop will be a blast.

The Big Takeaway for All Bloggers

Here’s the takeaway from all this: If you have a reasonably popular blog, you probably have audience members who want more from you. Definitely offer a product–but realize that not everyone will buy it. But also have a high-ticket item or two out there. Whether it’s personal coaching (which, I realize, not everyone wants to offer) or something–like artwork or an “everything package” of all your products–that is more unique and higher value, you need to have that bigger product.

And you need to have that product even if no one buys it…because it can help set a mental anchor that your products are more valuable.

Why Selling Cheap Products Could Threaten Your Blog’s Livelihood

I see far too many bloggers offering ebooks for as little as $2 or $5, and then offering consulting for a “special deal!” of $50/hour or $70/hour. With those prices, you’re doing yourself and your readers a disservice.

Think about how many hours of coaching you’re going to have to sell to make $4,000. You’re going to spend 80 hours of your time to make that much. And since most of those same blogs have the primary option being just 1 hour of consulting, you’re going to have to sell 80 people on the idea of consulting with you.

Since you’re selling yourself so cheaply, that $10,000/month–or whatever your blog income target is–is going to start looking an awful lot like a full-time job. But that’s only because you’ve made it that way. Start valuing yourself more and start charging more. (Hint: You attract more interesting people when you value yourself more, too.)

How to Overcome Your Big “Buts”

One of the most common reactions I get when I write a blog post like this is “But Erica, I didn’t sell a business for $1 million, so I can’t possibly charge what you charge!” First of all, (forgive the rant) but I am so tired of people using that as an excuse!

I started Internet marketing in February 2008 as a complete newbie. At Frank Kern’s Mass Control seminar in April 2008, I turned to the person next to me and asked “What’s a continuity program?” (Turns out, a continuity program is a product that is billed monthly–much like the web hosting company I created previously!)

I started this blog in December 2007. My goal for 2008 was to earn $10,000/month from it. It didn’t happen. In 2009, I was sick for 9 months and offered a coaching program that didn’t work out–mostly because I was too sick to really keep up with it. I still wasn’t making $10,000/month.

Now, it’s 2010, and the $10,000/month goal is in sight. But it has practically nothing to do with me selling my business for $1 million! Very little of my business experience from my web hosting company translates into Internet marketing wealth–otherwise, I would have been making $10,000/month two years ago! Internet marketing is a new world for me. That’s why I’m blogging about it as I go and sharing my honest truths with you.

I can happily sell consulting for $500/hour all day for two reasons:

1. I believe that what I offer is worth that much.
2. I have testimonials that show that an hour of my time is worth 20 times that (or more) to a motivated entrepreneur who is ready to take action.

That’s it. Nothing to do with my past. Stop using your past as an excuse. It’s what you do for others that matters, not how much money you’ve made in your lifetime.

(end rant!)

How to Do What I Did

I got here because I persisted. I doggedly refused to give up when my blog refused to “grant me my wish” of making me $10,000/month. In the meantime, I kept learning. I built an email list. I grew my traffic via SEO and guest posting. I surveyed my readers to find out what you wanted. I wrote great post after great post after great post. And finally, I made an offer…and then, another, bigger offer.

The “make an offer” part was the part I was missing. And, if you have reasonably good traffic and a decent-sized list (500-800 people), you, too, should start thinking about what offer to make. Even if you’re just getting started, start sketching out ideas for paid products, and focus on that as well as writing good content. You can start out with a smaller offer, but don’t forget to have a big offer visible on your site as well.

If you want to make real money blogging, get a product out there and start selling it. And start considering what higher-ticket item your readers will want to buy from you. Then offer it. That’s the fastest way I know of to make more money with your blog.

Recommended Reading:

• You Are Worth More Than You Think. If you’ve ever said “I just don’t have enough time to…”, this post is for you…
• 20 Ways to Make Money Online Fast. Still one of my most popular posts; these 20 ways to make money online fast are legitimate, scam-free, and can get money in your pocket quickly. Check it out!
• Blog Success Manifesto. My Blog Success Manifesto is a 62-page free ebook with 30 tactical tips to help you grow your blog faster than you ever have before. Check it out now!

I bought erica.biz and moved my blog over to it in December 2007. At the time, I had negligible traffic and only 70 subscribers–mostly my real-life friends.

By December 2009, two short years later, I was getting over 15,000 visitors a month from Google alone–and over 30,000 unique visitors a month total.

Now, I’m going to show you exactly how to do the same thing–get a massive wave of traffic and visitors to your blog or website–for far less than you would pay for pay-per-click advertising!

I’ll show you how to get targeted traffic so you can make sure the people you get are interested in your product or service.

And I’ll show you how to use a simple strategy to rank #1 for Google for keywords that people are actually typing in…like “earn money online”, for which erica.biz ranked #1 out of over 24 million results for several months.

Best of all, I’m offering all of this at a groundbreaking price (to thank you for being a subscriber) so that you have absolutely no excuses to not take me up on this limited-time offer.

Introducing Guest Post Secrets

Here is a simple strategy, step by step, that shows you how to get top bloggers to not only link to your site, but feature your product or service.

I’ve used this same system to drive over 4,000 people to erica.biz in a single day. Another 2-day period using this system brought in over 700 new subscribers to my mailing list. In fact, if you found me from another popular blog like I Will Teach You to Be Rich or Get Rich Slowly, you’ve seen this strategy in action.

Best of all…you can use this whole strategy, over and over again, and it won’t cost you a dime to drive this traffic to your site. The top bloggers will happily help you for free. I show you how.

How much would it cost you on Google Adwords to drive that much traffic to your site? Even if you are only paying 10 cents per click (which, let’s face it, is pretty cheap these days!), it would cost you four hundred dollars to drive 4,000 visitors to your website or blog.

I did it for free, and you can do it, too, within 7 days of taking action and investing in Guest Post Secrets.

Take a look at Guest Post Secrets today and get a breakthrough introductory price!

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. Who is Guest Post Secrets designed for?
A. Anyone with a blog or website who would like to drive targeted traffic from the Internet’s hottest blogs to their site without paying a dime for that traffic!

Q. Who wouldn’t buy Guest Post Secrets?
A. If you don’t already have a blog or website, this isn’t for you. But if you do–and you want a massive wave of traffic to your site–buy it.

Q. Do I have to do any work?
A. You’ll need to write an article. But it’s not as hard as you think, even if you don’t fancy yourself as a writer. Once you are inside Guest Post Secrets, I’ll show you some great examples of easy articles you can write and exactly how to get the big bloggers to say “yes”.

Q. I really need someone to walk me through this step-by-step. Does Guest Post Secrets do that?
A. I include step-by-step email templates that are foolproof, so you can feel confident emailing even the biggest bloggers. I explain the entire process, including what to do if you get stuck.

Q. Do I need to be super-techie to do this?
A. Not at all! If you can write a document in Microsoft Word, you’ll do absolutely fine. If you’re already writing a blog, this will be a cinch. I walk you through it step-by-step.

Q. What if it doesn’t work?
A. I mentioned Guest Post Secrets earlier on erica.biz without even linking to it, and several people bought it. One of them, Katrina McQuarrie, wrote me back an (unsolicited) email that said this. I’ll let the results speak for themselves:

“I greatly enjoyed the videos in Guest Post Secrets. Not only did they sound and look professional, you have a very good speaking voice and a great way of breaking things down step by step. 

I especially liked how you called out specific resources and provided cut and paste email templates.  You made it so easy to start guest posting; all the tools were right there for me.  In the 6 days since I bought your product, I’ve already sent out one guest post (will be published Monday), received a request to guest post from a second blog, and queried a third site and been accepted to do 2 for them.  (I offered two possible topics and the blog author liked them both!)

Thanks for taking the time to make up such a helpful product. It was just what I needed."

-Unsolicited email from Katrina McQuarrie, who runs Kick-Ass Genealogy

If, for some reason, you aren’t 100% satisfied with Guest Post Secrets, you have a full year to request a no-hassle complete refund.

Q. I’ve heard of guest posting, and have read blog posts about it. What does Guest Post Secrets have that those blog posts don’t?
A. I go far more in-depth than anyone I’ve ever seen. In fact, I even bought another “guest posting” information product and it didn’t have the concrete information mine has. Just some of many examples:

• How to get your blog or website to rank highly in Google for search terms using guest posting
• The most important part of your guest post (something that every single post I’ve ever read about guest posting neglects to mention)
• How to find blogs in your niche to guest post on
• Exactly, word for word, what to say to get big bloggers to say “yes”
• What to do if you don’t have a blog

There’s no single blog post that will cover all of this information. In fact, the videos in Guest Post Secrets have over 30 minutes of content, plus downloadable step-by-step email templates. I’ve made this as foolproof as possible, because I want you all to have access to this fantastic source of waves of free traffic.

Guest Post Secrets is $67, but for you only, since you read my blog, use coupon ERICABIZ to get $20 off–just $47 for a limited time!

Don’t let the low price fool you–this is amazing, never-before-seen, high-quality video content. I want to give you the first access to this product. Imagine, in just one week (or less!), getting a huge wave of traffic to your blog or website without having to pay a dime for it. How liberating!

This is the #1 strategy I’ve used to grow erica.biz, and now it is yours. Only $47 with your special coupon.

Invest in Guest Post Secrets now.

If you own a blog or a website and need more targeted traffic to it, don’t pass up this opportunity. There won’t ever be a lower price for Guest Post Secrets (and frankly, I should charge a lot more!)

Invest Now!

Stop throwing your money away on AdWords, advertising, and other paid traffic strategies.

Purchase Guest Post Secrets now.

Questions? Post them as comments below, or contact me directly.

Please note: Your credit card statement will show “Inspiring Innovators.” That’s my company’s name.

I look forward to seeing you on the inside of Guest Post Secrets!

Purchase Guest Post Secrets now.

My Upcoming Product

In January, I will formally release my first information product! It’s called Guest Post Secrets, and it’s designed to help up-and-coming bloggers get a massive wave of thousands of targeted visitors and subscribers to their blog. Guest Post Secrets will sell for under $50, which will be well worth it when you consider how much it will grow your blog.

Guest Post Secrets consists of approximately thirty minutes of video content that I created using Camtasia–a piece of software that records your computer screen while you talk into an attached microphone.

In Guest Post Secrets, I explain what a guest post is and how much traffic it can drive to your blog. A typical guest post I write sends me about 4,000 new visitors. Over half of my 7,000 subscribers have found me through guest posts I’ve done, and my last guest post brought me over 700 new subscribers. I believe anyone can grow a huge blog by guest posting, but most bloggers don’t know how to guest post or aren’t getting responses when they email other bloggers for guest posts.

The current guest posting guides that are out there aren’t very deep. Guest Post Secrets goes crazy deep–showing you the exact email I send to top bloggers to get them to say “yes”, exactly what you need to say in your followup email, how to format your guest post, and examples of guest posts anyone can write to drive tons of traffic back to their blog.

All told, it’s about 30 minutes of video content, plus a “10 Mistakes” PDF that goes over the most common guest post mistakes, plus the email text that you can download and send to top bloggers–and some as-yet-unnanounced bonuses that are going to absolutely rock!

Earlier, I wrote about a four-step process I use whenever I create a new product. I used this method to create Guest Post Secrets. Now, I’ll run it through with you, show you the cost breakdown, as well as showing you each step I took to make my three videos into a product.

The Breakdown–Step 1: Determine A Market

I created my Blog Success Manifesto and released it for free. With over 2,000 downloads in the first few months, plus rave reviews and tons of people asking me for more information, I quickly determined that there was a market of bloggers who wanted more traffic to their blogs.

But a lingering question remained: Would up-and-coming bloggers pay for quality information, or did they all only want free stuff?

Step 2: Decide What Your Product Will Be

Earlier in 2009, I quietly took on a few clients who paid a monthly fee and got personal access to me. They were all interested in learning about blogging.

I created many videos before finally creating three videos, in a series, that I felt summed up the best way to quickly get traffic and grow a blog–no matter whether you were starting from scratch or just wanted to grow your community faster.

I had a decision to make: Should I release this now, as a less expensive product, or keep adding to it and making it a bigger, more expensive product?

I’ve heard conflicting advice from this from other Internet marketers. Some say releasing a less expensive product undercuts your value and time spent creating the product. Others say it helps establish you and get your name out there.

Finally, I decided I needed to get a product out there. I couldn’t know whether people were willing to pay for this information without releasing a product into the market. Releasing a quality, yet inexpensive, product, would allow me to test the market quickly and either poll my customers to create a larger product later or–if it bombed–to move on to a different, more lucrative market.

Step 3: Actually Create the Product

I sent my unpolished videos off to a fantastic video editor in the Philippines, who, for $3/hour, edited out all my pauses, “um”s, and mistakes, and sent them back to me as Flash video files.

Total spent:
Camtasia: $292 at Amazon (cheaper than Camtasia’s website)–but get the 30-day free trial to start out.
Video editing: Under $10.

Next step: I needed a name! I brainstormed several names in my trusty notebook, finally deciding on Guest Post Secrets. I registered guestpostsecrets.com through eNom–my chosen domain name reseller. I already have hosting through ServInt.

Total cost to register the domain name: $10.

I’ve been a web designer since 1996, but design is one of the easiest things to outsource–if you know where to look. I had some good recommendations in this area, and decided quickly on Killer Covers.

I immediately ordered a Killer Website Brand Pack from Killer Covers, and they turned around a fantastic mini-site design in a couple days, complete with HTML files I could edit myself and insert my sales letter into. I also had a professional-looking cover graphic for my product. (If you’ve ever wondered how product creators get those graphics that look like product boxes, CD cases, or book covers, Killer Covers does exactly that!)

Total cost for Killer Covers website and e-cover design: $297. (Note: If you just want a cover, that’s a lot cheaper…check Killer Covers for more information.)

Meanwhile, Lisa, my primary VA, was building out the back end of the product. She installed Wishlist Member, set up Wordpress with the correct plugins, and inserted the videos into the site. She configured Wishlist Member to work with my shopping cart and merchant account. I could now accept payments!

I added some minor site tweaks, and the back end was ready in just a couple days.

Total costs: Merchant account: Powerpay = $10/month (plus transaction fees)
Shopping cart: 1ShoppingCart = $99/month
Lisa’s time: 5 hours @ $26/hour = $130
Wishlist Member: $97 for a 1-site license

I also had another VA work on what would become an amazing upsell product: a list of 100+ blogs that accept guest posts. He spent 12 hours compiling a great list of blogs, complete with Alexa rankings, categories, etc. This has already been worth its weight in gold to me alone; I’ve discovered several popular blogs I was unaware of that I can write guest posts for.

I’ll sell this as an optional add-on for a low price.

Cost: 12.5 hours at $3.33/hour: $41.63.

Step 4: Sell Your Product

Creating a sales letter can definitely be outsourced, but as a writer, this was one thing I decided to take on myself.

I’m going to be frank: Writing a sales letter, especially if you haven’t done it before, isn’t easy. It’s also absolutely nothing like writing a blog post or a newspaper article–the two writing jobs I have a lot of experience with.

The best way to write a sales letter is to download a swipe file of other great sales letters and copy them, sentence for sentence, making them work with your product. Changing from the “voice” of a blog post, where most of the writing is about me, to the voice of a sales letter, which is all about you and your desires, is hard.

I believe copywriting is a skill that can be learned, but it’s not something you’re going to learn overnight. It is probably worth it to pay a professional copywriter for a “copy critique.” I did this and had two copywriters basically rip my sales letter apart. It was a huge blow to my ego, but I have to admit the revised letter cleaned up nicely.

There’s still more work to do on my sales letter, but it’s already far better than my first draft. Ironically, you will probably find that writing the sales letter will take you as much or more time than creating the actual product. That’s to be expected.

I did shoot a video for the sales letter, too, remembering to put myself in my buyers’ position. I uploaded it to YouTube. Then, when a copywriter said it was too long (at 7 minutes), I cut a minute out of it and uploaded it again today.

Hardware and Other Supplies

I needed a microphone to do the audio recording part of the product with Camtasia. I picked up an Audio-Technica AT2020 USB microphone and a pop filter, plus a better microphone stand. This makes the audio portion of the videos sound fantastic.

Total cost for microphone, pop filter and stand: ~$135.

For the sales letter video, I used my Canon HG10 camcorder (which has since been supplanted by the Canon HG21) on a tripod mount, and shot in HD. I also recently invested in a wireless lavalier microphone so I don’t sound so “echo-y” on video.

This setup will not only help me with this product, but with many future products. Of course, if you don’t have the budget for a full-blown video setup, start with an inexpensive Flip HD camera. I do recommend budgeting for the above microphone setup, however; it’s well worth the cost.

Total Costs

At this point, I’d say I have well over 40 hours of personal time invested in this product, in addition to the costs above.

My total costs were $2618.63, not including copy critiques or my swipe file.

My recurring costs are $107/month for my shopping cart and merchant account.

If you subtract out the video camera and the wireless lavalier microphone that goes with it, and instead buy a $149 Flip camera, and create your product within Camtasia’s 30-day free trial window, your total costs would be $1176.63.

Will This Product Make Money?

This is the fun (and somewhat scary!) part of being an entrepreneur. You invest tons of time, and at least a bit of money. Unlike a job, you’re not guaranteed payment for that time. You may release a product and it totally bombs–or you may release a product where your total earnings make you an hourly wage that would make any bigwig CEO proud.

The only way to truly know if your product will be successful is to sell it. Don’t let yourself get overwhelmed, or think “I don’t have thousands of dollars to spend!” If you have more time than money, use your time to hone your copywriting and content creation skills. If you have some money, as little as a few hundred dollars is all you’ll probably need to develop a great product.

What to Do With A Minimal Budget?

Assuming you already know what product you plan to create, and have a name for it…

If I only had $300 to spend, no question, I’d spend it on a Killer Covers web design. You can borrow a microphone and get a free trial of Camtasia–but web design is harder to do yourself, and it’s worth it to pay Killer Covers instead of spending hours doing it yourself. (This, coming from someone who made her living as a full-time Web designer and developer for years!)

Recommended Reading:

• My Instant Swipe File. Very useful product, especially with its current low price. I purchased it and am using the template inside it to help develop my sales letter.

Are you planning to create an information product in 2010? Have questions about creating a product? Let me know in the comments!

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