Get in the fast lane on the Information Super Highway.
In case you haven't noticed, the world is experiencing an
information explosion. Before the turn of the century, the
majority of the households in North American will have access
to hundreds of channels of interactive television giving every
customer instant unlimited access to information,
communications and entertainment.
In addition, there are tens of millions of computer screens
hooked up to the net….yours included. The Internet is
exploding. People are communicating and sharing information
like never before.
Staking your claim in the great info-rush of the new
millennium.
Who is going to provide all of the programming for the 500
channels, the on-line data bases, the hungry airwaves? You
are! You are the source of the ideas, information, data and
entertainment to fill the voracious appetite of millions of
info-maniacs.
Profits in the shift from the information age to the
communication age.
The serious money in the future, however, is not just in
providing information or raw data. We are already drowning in
information. We are on information overload. We are data
drunk. The problem is not a lack of information or ideas but a
lack of information that is packaged properly. Your job in the
future is to convert the mountains of raw data into
specialized knowledge presented in a way the consumer can
assimilate and use quickly:
Specialized knowledge packaged properly
organized
simplified
beautified
systematized,
personalized
interactive
multi-media
delivered to your house
ready to use
on demand
instantly.
Time is the currency of the new millennium. Time is our
most valuable asset. Since all of us are already on
information overload, with too much information to absorb and
too little time to absorb it, we all will be looking for
information that is "time friendly." We won't want
to waste time ready, studying, reorganizing general data to
fit our unique circumstances and problems. We'll want
information we can USE NOW, FAST AND EASY.
The best way to distinguish your information from the
hundreds of competitors is to emphasize the most important
competitive advantage: YOUR INFORMATION MUST BE SIMPLE, EASY
TO USE AND PROVIDE FAST RESULTS.
Your advertising should emphasize this.
Being well-informed in the age of information
"haves and have nots."
The future is being fired at us at point blank range and we
will need to react in lightning quick time. Those who react
slowly will find themselves amongst the "information
have-nots."
In order to be prepared to understand how to deliver your
information in the fastest, easiest way, you must be
technologically up to speed or you will be left in the dust.
The information business is moving at Mach 2. You must be
computer literate and you must teach your children and
employees to be computer literate. Your customers will demand
it and your competitors will force it. You can't hide your
head in the sand and hope the storm blows over. It ain't gonna
blow over. It's only gonna blow harder.
How to turn you expertise/passion/hobby into lifetime
streams of cash flow.
Now, with all of this talk of the billions being spent on
the super information highway, you might be a bit intimidated.
You might wonder how "little old you" can compete
with the big boys. How can you sell your ideas, you life's
expertise in the face of the media moguls? Fact is, anyone
with a good idea, persistence and some savvy can make a
million dollars selling information. You don't need a huge
advertising budget and a staff to spend it. All you really
need is
An interesting story
or
An expertise that people want
and
A powerful marketing plan
The Book Within: Everyone has at least one good book in
them
It is my firm belief that everyone...including you...has a
least one good book in them. When you've finished reading this
special report, you'll realize that you have enough
information and experience in your head right now to
turn into a lifetime stream of income. You have a book in you
that is just waiting to be unleashed.
With some proper positioning, your book can become the
cornerstone of an information empire. An information empire?
Yes. And I'm going to prove it to you.
The next time you wonder whether "there's gold in them
thar hills," remember the example of 75 year old Walter
Swann from Arizona. A few years ago he wrote a book about
growing up in Arizona with his brother, Henry. He called his
book "Me and Henry." Sounds like a money making
title, doesn't it? But no publisher would publish it. So he
published it himself. But no book store would buy it. So
opened his own book store. But his book store is unique. It
only carries one title...that's right, "Me and
Henry." He calls it the One Book, Book Store. The only
book you can buy in his book store is "Me and
Henry." Dumb idea, right? Wrong. He sells thousands of
books world wide. And makes thousands of dollars a month from
this one simple idea. In fact, business has been so good that
he has written another book. This one is called, "Me and
Mama." It's also for sale in a special room in the One
Book Book Store. It's called the Other Book Book Store.
What I want you to realize is that you, your life story or
your life's expertise have market value. It may have enough
market value to support you for life.
Turn your life story into money...even if you've been a
miserable failure.
Almost all success books start off with a miserable
failure. The author tells how he or she used to be fat, poor,
ugly, unhappy, lonely, addicted and through some miracle, will
power or new found knowledge was able to overcome failure and
rise to the heights of success. Let me give you some pretty
impressive examples,
Author Title Subject
Tony Robbins Unlimited Power Success
Susan Powter Stop the Insanity Diet
John Bradshaw Homeward Bound Self Esteem
And the list goes on and on. Each of these info-preneurs
used the story of their rise from the ashes of failure to
create an information empire. Each of them now produces books,
seminars, newsletters, tape programs, video courses, speeches,
consulting relationships and infomercials. They turned their
failure to success story into millions of dollars.
Everything that has happened to you, good or bad, has
cash value.
Do you ever wonder how those famous stars on those diet
commercials are able to take the weight off and keep it off?
How do they do it? Where do they get the will power to lose
all that weight and keep it off? Think! If someone offered
your a half a million dollars to do a diet commercial,
wouldn't you be able to find the motivation somehow?
Now take this to the next logical conclusion. What if
someone offered you ten million dollars to turn your life
around right now. How much would it take for you to be
motivated to perfect your relationships, to get in shape, to
get your financial act together, to be a top salesperson, etc.
What if you decided that YOU ARE THE BEFORE AND AFTER STORY?
Fix yourself then you, too, can market your new-found
"know how."
You don't even need a unique, new system. It can be old
knowledge, repackaged and remarketed in new ways. Look at all
the diets out there. There are only 3 variables in the diet
game: food, exercise and mental attitude. Susan Powter, in her
hugely successful diet infomercial and book, "Stop the
Insanity!" doesn't teach anything new. She teaches
old stuff in a unique way. And MAKES TENS OF MILLIONS OF
DOLLARS DOING IT!
The formula is pretty simple:
Identify a Core Human Desire/Need
Find new technology for solving this Core Desire/Need
and/or
Find a new way to market to this Core Desire/Need
Let's look at Tony Robbins. Why is he so successful? He has
identified a core desire/need (The need to achieve success. )
He applied a new technology (Neuro-Linguistic Programming). He
used himself as the BEFORE and AFTER story. He used a new way
to market (Infomercials). And the rest is history.
You don't have to do it on such a grand scale. You can be
like Walter Swann and his tiny One Book Book Store. The point
I'm trying to make is that one mediocre idea with some good
marketing power can generate a lifetime stream of cash flow.
And with some luck can turn into millions of dollars.
Everything in your life has value. The failures. The
successes. It's all part of the equation.
And if you want to get paid millions of dollars...start
trying out how to turn your life around now and then tell the
rest of us how you did it.
My story: How one simple idea grew into a billion dollar
business.
The above formula is exactly the same one I used to take in
over a hundred million dollars over the past 20 years. I
wanted to become successful...to be wealthy. So I applied
myself to real estate in the late seventies after I got out of
college with only a few hundred dollars in my pocket and no
job. In a few short years I had make a lot of money in real
estate. I started sharing some of my ideas with friends and
they were very interested. They started using my ideas and
began making a lot of money. I wondered if anyone else might
be interested and ran a small classified ad in my local
newspaper. It offered to teach them
How to Buy Real Estate with Little or No Money Down.
The phone rang off the hook. I taught small classes at
first, then graduated to large weekend seminars, then, wrote a
book, which helped to promote the seminars...then, on to
newsletters, tapes, videos, newsletters, etc.
The concept of real estate investing was as old as the
hills. What I added to the equation was to take old techniques
and to repackage them under the banner of a single, sexy
concept, Nothing Down. Here is the result,
2.5 million books at $20 = $50,000,000
100,000 seminars at $500= $50,000,000
20,000 trainings at $5,000= $100,000,000
Other misc. stuff= $20,000,000
$220,000,000
That's over two hundred million and counting, just through
my businesses alone.
Then, with all of the knock-offs of Nothing Down from Dave
Del Dotto, Tommy Vu, Carlton Sheets and dozens of other copy
cats, the tally goes into the hundreds and hundreds of
millions of dollars. During my lifetime over a billion dollars
is going to be dug out of the mine shaft called Nothing Down
real estate. It was A BILLION DOLLAR IDEA!
Billion dollar ideas are floating around in the air right
now. You have one or two every day. The key is to learn how to
crack the code, to discover the combination to the vault.
Using new technology or a new marketing angle, you can tap
into your own billion dollar idea.
How to make at least $1,000 a day selling
"how-to" information to eager info-maniacs.
Once you "crack the code" and find that your idea
or product has uncovered a hungry market, the next step is to
roll out your marketing to different marketing media. I first
started in the classifieds. Then, I graduate (fearfully) into
display ads in the newspapers. My first ad was $300. I thought
I was betting the farm! This brought even more business. Then,
I graduated to full page ads in the newspaper. (Which really
scared the heck out of me. Imagine dropping $10,000 on a
single, one time only full page ad. If it works, you make good
money. If it doesn't work, you just burned up ten grand or
more. An associate of mine dropped $60,000 in media for a
large seminar on the day before of a major Los Angeles
earthquake. $60,000 down the drain! Ouch!)
From full page ads, my highly skilled marketing team moved
into television advertising. The infomercial for the Nothing
Seminar in the early 80's was the very first successful
infomercial ever produced. It was created by Roger Larsen who
is the pioneer of seminar marketing and one of the geniuses of
the business. I was so lucky to have found him and to have
been able to work with him for so many years. I have since
created and starred in 9 different infomercials. Some with
great success and others total failures. Ironically, the
cheapest ones seemed to make the most money.
With a winning idea, and many different media to market it,
we then branched into the many related support
products...bringing in millions of more dollars. Once you
uncover a mother lode of ore, you can spend the rest of your
lifetime digging it out...as I have done.
With a few minor adjustments, this is going to be your same
trajectory of success. But before you launch this new
business, I just want to educate you to the fabulous benefits
of being in the information business as compared to any other
business that you might be tempted to get into.
"The Best Business in the World: Benefits of
selling Information
Unlimited world wide market
Easy to research
Easy to create
Easy and cheap to test
Easy and cheap to produce, inventory and correct.
Low cost start-up
High perceived value
High mark up
Mobility: Operate from any mailbox in the world.
Copyright protection from competitors
Prestigious, impressive career. "I'm an author."
Satisfying: A permanent record for future generations.
I can't think of a more satisfying career than producing
information products. They are easy and cheap to create and
produce, fun to sell, and do so much good for the consumer. I
get success letters from hundreds of happy, satisfied
customers each year who share their great gratitude for what
using my ideas has done to improve their lives. I keep
pinching myself.
"You mean, I can get paid for this?!"
There are 3 Essential Skills that you need as an info-preneur.
Skill #1. Research and creation expertise : How to
research, discover, acquire, organize your ideas.
It all starts with a core expertise. What do you know that
we don't? Or who do you know that knows something that the
rest of us need or want to know? You don't have to spend years
learning a core expertise. You can find some expert who is
under-marketed and take his or her idea to the marketplace.
Just remember to organize this information in the
communication age style...easy to learn, simple to use, fast
results.
Skill #2. Packaging expertise: How to express,
display, package, communicate yourself
Sometimes the line between success and failure is razor
thin. I know of an info-preneur who spent years and tens of
thousands of dollars creating a product called Compact
Classics. He had taken and condensed all of the great classic
books in fiction and non-fiction into a two page format.
Instead of taking weeks to read the original, you get the meat
of the book in only two pages. Only one problem. No one would
buy it. And thousands of dollars went down the drain. Until it
got repackaged and retitled. The new title?
The Great American Bathroom Book.
The idea caught on and a millions dollars later, the idea
is still pumping out cash. By the way, you can buy the same
book with either title. If you are the high brow type, you
order the Compact Classics title. If you are the Larry Lunch
Bucket type, it's the Bathroom book. But neither market would
have enjoyed the book if some savvy packager hadn't
"cracked the code."
Here are some core packaging skills you will need to
develop, rent or acquire:
Find the best prices for materials
Designing useful, interesting packaging.
Creating low cost ways to organize your materials
Skill #3. Marketing expertise: How to sell,
distribute, disseminate, promote yourself and your
product.
Marketing is the essential skill. You can market junk with
right marketing campaign. Quality work is doomed to remain
stuck in your computer data banks unless you learn how to
market it. Here are some core marketing skills which you will
have to buy, rent or acquire:
Writing compelling copy
Understanding psychology and human nature
Learning the secrets of direct mail advertising
Buying the best and cheapest advertising.
Tracking your results.
Managing a database.
Tapping into the Internet
How to find the millions in profits overlooked by most
info-preneurs.
You don't need to be an expert in the above skills, but you
do need to align yourself with the leading experts. For
instance, suppose you go to a local church meeting on
parenting because you are having trouble with your teenagers.
You find the room is filled to overflowing. You realize that
you are not alone...there are hundreds of other parents in
your same predicament. A light bulb comes on in your head.
AHA! Here is a hungry market place. You listen to the speaker
and see that his material is perfectly organized for the
communication age...it appears to be fun, fast, simple. It
promises swift results and is easy to learn. You go home and
try a few of the techniques on your own teenagers and Voila!,
you have them eating out of your hand in no time. Hmmmm! There
might be something here. You call the parenting seminar leader
and find he is just a mom and pop operator. He doesn't have a
clue about marketing, packaging or promoting. You ask him if
he would be willing to let you market him...on a non-exclusive
basis. It could mean a few extra thousand in his pocket. He
agrees and you draw up an agreement. Then, you assemble your
copywriting experts to create an preliminary ad campaign...
first testing in direct mail and limited classified ads. The
ads start to pull. You branch out onto the Internet and your
web page is deluged with "hits." You realize that
you've got a tiger by the tail. You create your
product...tapes, books, seminars...and roll out your marketing
blitz. You make money, your expert makes money and your
information empire is launched.
What made all of this possible? You recognized a great
idea. You got the rights to market it. You brought in your
team to help you capitalize on it and all of you took
wheelbarrows full of money to the bank. Most experts out there
have no idea how to create, package and market their
expertise. There are literally thousands them out there
waiting to be "discovered." You might be one of
them.
5 Rings of Riches: The vast opportunities that await all
info-preneurs.
One of the least understood concepts, even by successful
info-preneurs, is how vast are the opportunities for making
money from just one good idea. I'll explain this to you by
teaching you what I call the 5 rings of information riches.
Think of your info-business as a series of 5 concentric
circles. At the center is the bulls-eye...or the first ring.
Ring one. Succeeding in your core expertise.
You must have a core expertise that is either a
revolutionary new technology or is an old expertise that has a
new marketing strategy. My core expertise was real estate
investing. I became very good at it. Therefore, I could teach
it to others. As I said earlier, you don't have to be the
expert yourself. But you do need to borrow, license, acquire
the expertise from someone. You are looking for an expertise
that has a market that meets the following characteristics:
Finding a hungry marketplace
A large and growing body of interested people
Who can be easily identified
Who have an immediate need/want/problem
That they are highly motivated to solve
Who have the money to spend
And are willing to spend it
In an economic climate that encourages spending.
Think of your market as a school of fish. Does your market
contain enough fish? Is it a growing or declining school of
fish? Is it easy to find where they are and what their feeding
pattern is? Are they really hungry? Is the weather cooperating
for the ideal fishing conditions? Is there a certain bait that
makes them "bite like crazy?" Are they willing to
come out of the safe, dark depths of the bottom to fight for
this new bait?
Cracking the Code!
Once you have identified your market and your expertise
then, the process of "cracking the code" begins.
What I mean by cracking the code, is to find a way to offer
your expertise in such a way that the fish "rise to
bite."
Real estate investing was not new. But offering to show
people how to buy it with little or no money down was just the
right bait at the right time. There was a large and growing
school of baby boomers who were moving into their prime home
buying age in the late seventies. Inflation forced house
prices upward and created increased incentive to buy now. The
climate was right, the school of fish was hungry and they
needed to buy. My information was perfect. Now, later in the
eighties, the climate changed, inflation died, government tax
laws discouraged investment and the baby boomers moved on to
other interests. This doesn't mean there aren't still millions
to be made in real estate or in real estate information. But
the "feeding frenzy" is over, at least for now. You
are looking for a situation where feeding frenzy is about to
begin.
Basically, there are no real new or totally unique human
needs or wants. They have been the same for millennia. Sex,
money, self esteem, health, relationships, beauty, greed. Your
information should tap into one of these universal wants/needs
and whip up a large and growing school of fish into a feeding
frenzy.
The title you select, the words you use to market your
information, the benefits your information offers, the way it
is packaged will cause this to happen. Once you have
discovered the right combination of message and media, you
have cracked the code. Then, you are ready to move to the next
ring.
Ring Two: Teaching others specific know-how to succeed
in your core expertise.
First, I made money by investing in real estate (Ring One)
Then, I taught others how to succeed in real estate just like
me(Ring Two). There are about twenty ways to sell this Ring
Two information. In other words, there are twenty separate
$100,000 Plus a year businesses that result from having
cracked the code. Here is an incomplete list:
Ring Two businesses growing from your core expertise.
1. Author: Selling information to other
publishers.
2. Desktop publisher: Self publishing for yourself
or others.
3. Seminar promoter: Selling information in
seminars.
4. Public speaker: Selling information from
platform.
5. Telecommunicator: Selling info via 900 #s,
teleconferences.
6. Newsletter editor: Selling info in monthly
format.
7. Computer programmer: Selling info via discs and
CD's.
8. TV producer: selling info via TV
infomercials/shows.
9. Personal consulting: Selling personalized,
one/one info.
10. Professor/teacher/trainer: Education,
corporate, public.
11. Freelance writer: Selling info in magazine
articles.
12. Syndicated columnist: Selling info in
newspaper.
13. Media expert: Informing those who inform
others.
14. Talk Show/Info host- radio or TV.
15. Magazine publisher: Packaging info in magazine
form.
16. Game designer: Selling info packaged as a
game.
17. Calendar creator: Selling info packaged as a
calendar.
18. Product designer: Selling info on T-Shirts,
mugs, posters.
19. Licenser: Licensing expertise/name/ideas to
promoters.
20. On line expert: Producing on line services and
products.
21. Audio Cassette Marketer: Creating audio
programs
22. Internet expert: Show people how to market on
the net
Most successful info-preneurs have only tapped into half a
dozen of the above businesses. They are leaving millions of
dollars on the table. Once they see the big picture, they are
more able to capitalize on the opportunities around them.
Then, they are ready to expand into the third concentric
circle or what I call, the Third Ring.
Ring Three. Using your specific experience to teach
general success skills to your market place.
For example, one of the greatest salesmen in the world, Zig
Ziglar, honed his sales skills selling pots and pans. But
there wasn't a large and growing market of hungry pots and
pans salespeople to which to market his expertise. Therefore,
he became a general expert in the broad field of sales
training. He went from specific expertise to general expertise
and made millions of dollars. Mary Lou Retton won gold medals
in the 1984 Olympics for gymnastics. There wasn't a big market
for her information to other gymnasts. She now delivers
general success and motivation speeches to corporate audiences
worldwide - on the subject of how to be a gold medal
performer. She makes huge speaking fees and enjoys a nice
info-preneuring income from her Third Ring. Other Third Ring
opportunities are listed below:
Success trainer on the subjects of:
Success and Motivation
Leadership
Goal Setting
Time Management
Sales Training
Management
Team building
Stress
Business consultant on the subjects of:
How to run a successful business
Entrepreneur ship
Advertising
Marketing
Strategy
Financial Analysis
Computer services
Marketing your services on the internet
There are literally thousands of successful Third Ring
info-preneurs nationwide. Harvey MacKay with his best-selling
book How to Swim with the Sharks and a host of other
books is one example. He made his fortune in the envelope
business in Minnesota. What do envelopes have to do with you?
Nothing. But he claims that his great success in the envelope
business has given him the right to teach us all kinds of
general success principles in the areas of sales, management
and positive attitude. And he makes millions turning his
specific know how into general how to information.
Ring Four: Marketing other products to your database.
Once you have attracted a growing satisfied customer data
base, you may approach your data base with other products and
services. For example, my original data base is comprised of
people who have attended my real estate seminars. But in
reality these people are entrepreneurs who like to explore
other money making opportunities. I can mine more money from
my data base by pursuing 4 separate routes:
1. Mailing list rental agency.
I could rent my list out to other similar, but
non-competing businesses to try to sell their products. Some
lists generate hundreds of thousands of dollars in list rental
fees to the primary info-preneur. There's a gold mine in those
names! That's why it's so important to gather and take care of
every name you do business with.
2. Lead generator for other businesses:
I could identify all non competitive ancillary
businesses that serve my database and use my influence to
convince my clients to buy other products. For example,
someone comes to me with a seminar on Discounted
Mortgages. They tell me that they will pay me $1 per name
for every name on my database for the privilege to use my
data base for marketing their products. This is without my
endorsement. My customers do not know that I am involved.
They just receive a mailing piece for the product and
choose to buy or not buy.
This could be even more lucrative if I choose to write
an endorsement letter encouraging my customer to use the
product. This is called an "endorsed mailing."
Of course, the seller of the product is much more
acceptable to my database if I give a hearty endorsement
so the fee for this privilege is higher.
3. Joint venture partner:
In some instances, you may even choose to split profits on
the sale of a product to your data base. In one seminar
arrangement, I split profits 50/50 with a seminar promoter who
sold a seminar to my database. I appeared at the seminar and
gave a hearty endorsement for all of my graduates to come. In
this case, the profit generated was much higher.
4. Direct marketer
If you have built up a great relationship with your data
base you may even influence them to buy other products that
the ones you are known for...even totally unrelated products.
I have sold cruises, other seminars and various financial
products. If they trust you, they will buy.
Ring Five: Support Services to Info-preneurs in other 4
rings
At the outer edge of the 5 concentric circles is Ring Five.
Some info-preneurs don't service the general market. They
focus on other info-preneurs. Once you get good at marketing
information, building data bases, taking care of your
customers, etc. you may also wish to share your new expertise
with other info-preneurs. If you were an especially gifted
copy writer, you may want to hire out your copywriting
services to other info-preneurs. You see, whatever your
experience in life, there is always a market for it. So keep
all of your ads, your tracking procedures, keep everything
that relates to creating your successful business. Eventually,
you may want to use it again in teaching others how to do what
you did. The following is a listing of at least 20 support
businesses for info-preneurs:
Printer
Copywriter: selling specific advertising concepts
Audio producer
Editorial services
Mailing list broker
Graphics artist
Ghost writer
Speech coach
Literary Agent
Venture capitalist
Infomercial producer
Infomarketing coach
Video reproduction
Cassette duplication
Advertising agency
Public relations
Book reviewer
Researcher
Information broker
Computer strategist
Internet webmaster
Web consultant
Examine these ideas often when you're doing about strategic
thinking about the direction of your new company. For
instance, as you look down the list of Ring Two opportunities,
which one strikes you as your lead businesses and which ones
will you follow with? You may be interested in teaching
seminars and using that as a base to establish a consulting
business and from there into a newsletter business. Or will
you write and market your own book, and then follow with
seminars and newsletters. Or will you write a newspaper column
which gives you leads to sell a home study course? You choose
the info path that fits your personality...but eventually you
will expand out to all layers of depth in each of the 5 rings.
The Info-funnel: Attracting lifelong customers into your
inner circle
Now that brings us to probably the most important concept
in all of information marketing. I sure I didn't originate
this concept but I have certainly developed it to meet my own
understanding of the business.
Let me explain by describing how we found customers for our
real estate seminars. First, we would place a newspaper ad to
invite people to come to a free 90 minute seminar or lecture.
Out of all of the universe of people who might be interested
in real estate investing, let's assume that 200 people showed
up. These people became part of my funnel. Those that didn't
show up were outside my funnel. By come to the free seminar,
the 200 people demonstrated that they were "warmer."
They were willing to expend effort to learn more. In sales
terms these were "prospects or leads." They were
warm leads but had not yet spent money. We knew that a certain
percentage of the audience would always buy a seminar right
there on the spot. For a $500-1,000 seminar it could be as
high as 20%. Generally, it was 10-15%. Just looking out at the
audience we knew that at least 10% had come there that night
ready to do something. Those who bought and came to the
weekend seminar became highly qualified leads... they had
tasted more of the product, had liked it and now were likely
to buy other products or seminars.
Visualize the free people at the wide, open part of the
funnel and those who attend the two day seminar further into
your funnel and finally the few who get everything you have to
offer...passing through the narrow part of the funnel ...into
your inner circle. These are your lifetime customers...your
groupies. They like what you do and they'll be lifelong fans.
These are your most valuable customers.
Determining the LTV of a customer in your funnel.
Just what is the value of a customer who enters your funnel
and stays in there for a long time? Tom Peters says that every
time a Federal Express courier comes into his office, the
driver should see $180,000 stamped on the head of the
secretary. His small firm of 30 people has a $1,500 a month
courier bill. That's $18,000 a year times ten years for a
total Long Term Value (LTV) of $180,000. And if the secretary
convinces just one other customer to start using the service,
the value doubles. But most mail couriers think that the value
of the customer is just the $13.95 they spend today. Each of
your customers is worth thousands of dollars if you'll take
care of them...much more than the initial $20 book or $500
seminar. The ultimate goal is to keep that customer loyal to
you and your products for ten years or more so that, by
offering great service and value, that customer can be enticed
to remain forever. The longer they stay, the deeper they go,
the more money you make.
Sometimes you can afford to lose money on the front end in
a free seminar or a free report in order to entice a customer
into your funnel where you can offer more profitable services.
So, the funnel starts out with your least expensive items at
the open end of the funnel and ends with your most expensive
item at the other end. Frankly, this is one of the reasons
that you are reading this free report. I realize that many who
read these very words will file this report in some forgotten
folder and forget about it. But a few, sharp readers will want
to know more. I’ve designed a power way to work with a few
of you…to help you get started on your road to information
fortunes. Just by requesting this free report, you will
receive more information on how you and I can work together to
launch your information empire.
How to Find Customers and Keep them.
Remember what my friend, Mark Victor Hansen, taught me:
"The sole purpose for your business is to Find
Customers and Keep them."
The key to keeping customers in your funnel is to develop a
long term relationship with them. A customer on your database
is not just a name on a computer. It's a real person with
changing and evolving needs and wants. They don't exist in a
static world where nothing changes. They are being constantly
bombarded with a hundred other options. You need to do
whatever it takes to keep them loyal to you...and keep them
out of your competitors funnel because the long term payout is
so great.
Any marketer will tell you that the hardest and most
expensive sale is to a new, cold customer who has never heard
of you before and has never tried your product. The cheapest,
easiest sale is from a satisfied customer. If you want to have
a real tough time in business...if you want each sale to be
hard and expensive...then play the old game of "find the
new customer." You cannot survive in the competitive in
the new millennium by constantly being forced to find new
customers. You must make it easy by taking care of the ones
you find...and making it easy for them to tell their friends.
Building a million dollar database relationship with your
valued clients.
Here is a specific example on how building a long term
relationships with your most valued customers can pay off big.
It comes from a great book on marketing, The Great
Marketing Turnaround: The Age of the Individual and How to
Profit From it. By Stan Rapp and Tom Collins published by
Prentice-Hall. I quote from page 62.
"The mid-sized Ukrop's (supermarket) chain, with 18
stores and a 25% market share in the Richmond area, was facing
increasingly tough competition. The area had experienced a 25%
increase in the total number of grocery stores and
supermarkets in just 5 years. Looking for a competitive
advantage, brothers James and Robert Ukrops...set up a test
program. A mailing was sent to households near the test store,
inviting them to become a Ukrop's "Valued Customer"
and enjoy "Automatic Savings Without Clipping
Coupons." Members would receive a bar-coded plastic card
to be presented and scanned each time they made purchases. And
they would get a monthly statement listing the
"electronic coupons" and rebates automatically
credited to their account based on their purchases of brands
offering special deals at the time --and telling them which
product purchases would qualify them for additional credits.
Every three months, members would then receive a voucher for
credits earned, and it could be used like cash at Ukrop's. They
sent out 5,000 test mailings and signed up 7,500 customers-
a 150% response and direct marketer would envy! Within three
months, overall sales volume in the test store had risen 10%,
and two-thirds of the sales were coming from Valued Customers.
Within two years Ukrop's had expanded the systems to all of
its(now 20) stores, and was mailing out to 196,000 members
each month its newsletter, Ukrop's Valued Customer News."
Did you notice what made the new program so successful?
They made shopping easier, simpler and more profitable.
Automatic savings without clipping coupons saved their
customers time and money. Brilliant! No wonder they had a 150%
response.
It has been said, "Sell the sizzle and not the
steak." I say, Sell the sizzle BUT DELIVER THE
STEAK! AND the salad AND the hors d'oeuvres AND the
dessert AND the after dinner drink, AND the limo ride to and
from the restaurant.
TAKE CARE OF YOUR CUSTOMERS. THERE'S A HUGE BOUNTY ON THEIR
HEAD!
Whether your selling widgets or information, you must
create a relationship with your clients whereby they feel that
you are their ultimate source for everything they want in
life.
If you are in the information business, proclaim yourself
as their information source...as their data detective. You can
follow them for life and refine and adapt your database to
their changing lifestyle needs. In the early eighties the baby
boomers on my data base wanted nothing down real estate. But
as they moved through the decade they became consumers for
dozens of other information products such as:
How to invest/make money
How to find bargains
Retirement planning
Estate planning
Mid life crisis counseling
How to make 200% per year in the stock market
Making a fortune on the Internet
By tracking their needs, as their information detective, I
am able to supply to them what they need at all the various
stages of their life. Once they are in my funnel, I try to
keep them there forever.
Just how quickly can you turn an idea into cash?
Well, having established this foundation, let's explore a
12 step Getting Started Action Plan so you can get some cash
flowing into your life. Do you remember the definition of a
straight line from you days in math class? It is the shortest
distance between two points. So what is the definition of a
money line? It is the shortest distance between an idea in
your head and a check in your mailbox. Suppose you wanted to
see how fast you could turn an idea in your head into cash.
What would the actions steps be? There are at least 12 of
them:
12 Step Surefire Getting Started Action Plan
Step One. Identify/create a database that matches your P/E
ratio.
If you want to prosper in the information business for a
long time, you should be marketing information that matches
your passion and your expertise. I call this the P/E ratio. It
is possible to market information that you are not passionate
about. But at the very least you should be an expert in that
subject. Conversely, it is possible to market information that
you are not an expert in...but at the very least you should be
passionate about it. Better, of course, to be a passionate
expert.
Let's suppose your subject is making money fast... a
subject that you are passionate about and have some expertise
in. You would like to share this information with the world
and make millions doing it. The first step would be to find a
data base of people who have shown an interest in money. By
exploring the Standard Rate and Data Survey publication at
your local library you can see lists and lists of
publications, newsletters, magazines, etc. that cater to
people who are interested in making, saving and investing
money.
By consulting with one of the many list brokers advertised
in Direct Marketing magazine or from a referral source, you
try to identify a current mailing list of potential customers
for your information. The characteristics of this mailing list
should match what we discussed earlier: your audience should
be a large and growing school of fish that is hungry and ready
to be whipped into a feeding frenzy.
If you have an existing data base of your previous
customers, you should probably test your new idea on them
first. But if you are starting from scratch, then you'll have
to build a new database from the names of your closest
friends, family members, the groups or associations you belong
to, your co-workers and anyone else you meet for the rest of
your life. ( Other than finding and keeping customers, the
most important function you must perform as an info-preneur is
to constantly build your database.)
Using your current customer data base or a cold list, as
selected by your list broker, you need to determine the
profile of your ideal customer. Who is your target audience?
How old are they? Where do they live? What are their
interests? What magazines do they read?
Of course, the Internet is the hottest place to build your
own database rather than rent one. Notice how we acquired your
name. You must have visited my site and requested to receive
my netletter along with 3 special reports. I hope you’re
enjoying the free information. I’ve tried to give great
value for you click. Every time people request the free
information, I acquire their e-mail address. And periodically,
I send out a special netletter packed with more money making
ideas. This builds a loyal customer base that has specifically
requested information about my subject….how to make money.
I’ll never forget when the power of an internet database
was demonstrated to me for the first time. A colleague came to
my house to show me how to make money from the Internet. I was
expecting it to take days….but I was astounded with what
happened. He typed in a short message to his growing e-mail
subscriber list offering to sell them one of my tape
packages….normally priced at $60….for only $30…half
price. I agreed to the low price as a test….realizing that
at this price my costs would be covered and I could still earn
a modest profit. He sent the e-mail to a small list of his
Internet newsletter subscribers and within seconds, the orders
started pouring in……people giving their credit card
numbers in their e-mails wanting the special offer. I was
amazed….it was so easy.
The power of building an internet data base is that most
people will NOT be interested in your offer at any given
time….but that a tiny percentage will be VERY interested.
Suppose you have a list of only 1,000 people. What kind of
response would you need to make $1000 a day. Only one person
in a thousand to buy your $1,000 hands-on training, two people
for your $500 home study course. 4 people for you $250 special
package deal, 10 people for your $100 kit. You only need a 1%
response rate!!!!!! And the larger your list, the more money
you make……or the lower response you need in order to make
at least $1,000 a day!
The key is the list. Now, you are on my list. Eventually,
I’ll offer something that is so enticing, so valuable, so
interesting to you, so rare that you, too, will want to be one
of the few who take advantage of that week’s special offer.
And we’ll both win.
So, how do you create such a list?
Step Two. Discover what information is vital to your chosen
database.
This is called market research. Just what do your customers
want? Have you ever asked them...called them up on the phone?
Are you trying to sell them what they want or what you think
they need? Ask. Ask. Ask. Find out what information is
vital to them and how they want that information.
There are many levels of information. At which level do
your customers want to be informed?
Do they want raw data? (i.e. the number of foreclosures
in Los Angeles County or the number of cars on the freeway at
rush hour.)
Do they want preliminary information? (i.e. A special
report on the main causes of cancer in females over 50 and how
to prevent it.)
Do they want in-depth know-how? (A complete home study
system on how to raise happy and healthy children.)
Do they want skills training? (A hands-on experiential
5 day training on how to be a successful public speaker.)
Do they want personal consulting? (Toll free or face to
face coaching on how to invest your personal money in stocks.)
The deeper the level of information, the more expensive the
product. How much information do the want? How much are they
willing to pay? These are all important questions and you
would do well to ask these questions to a hundred people
before you ever put your fingers to the typewriter keyboard.
Step Three. Discover who is already providing
information to your database.
Ask your target database where they are currently obtaining
their information. Your objective is to discover who are the
top information providers in your subject. Who are the best?
They must be doing something right. Make a list of the top 5
information providers.
Step Four. Discover how the 5 best communicate/sell to your
target database.
Call up each of your top 5 information competitors. Pretend
to be a customer ask each of them to send you their sales
literature. Ask where they are advertising. Find out, if
possible, how they get their leads. Solicit their mailing
pieces. Visit with their top salespeople. Let their
telemarketers try to sell you. What benefits do they
emphasize? What features do they brag about? Gather
information. Let your subconscious simmer about it.
Step Five. Discover what info/service/feature is missing
from above.
Let their salespeople sell you. Become a customer. Get
their product. Rip it apart. What makes it so special? Is it a
matter of design? Is it a matter of marketing? Find out their
strengths. Probe for weaknesses. Notice how other upstart
competitors are making inroads into the market share of the
top 5 companies. How are these smaller companies surviving?
What do they say to draw away customers from the big boys.
What niche are they exploiting?
Ask your target database what they don't like about your
competitor's product. Ask them what they would add to your
competitor's product to make it perfect. Ask them what they
would delete from your competitor's product that is not
necessary. Ask them to design it exactly the way they want it.
And remember, at the top of the list of competitive
advantages is ease of use and quick results.
Step Six. Create a competitive advantage. Position your
product better.
Remember, people are lazy. If they have a choice between
easy and hard they'll take easy EVERY SINGLE TIME! If they
have a choice between fast and slow, they'll take fast EVERY
SINGLE TIME. If they have a choice between simple and
complicated, they'll take simple EVERY SINGLE TIME. If you can
provide these things at a price that is a bit lower than your
competitor, odds are that you'll steal a bunch of business.
Now, a word about competition. Sometimes a beginner starts
with what he or she feels is a unique idea and naively rushes
off to start a business. Soon they discover that someone else
is already marketing this idea...sometimes with a very similar
title...and they get discouraged.
First, understand that there is an enormous number of
people in the world. If you can just entice 1/1000 of 1% of
the population in North America (that's 2,500 clients!) into
your funnel and take care of them...you'll probably be set for
life. (Remember the LTV of a customer. If each of your
customers spends just a $1,000 with you over the next ten
years, that's TWENTY FIVE MILLION DOLLARS!)
Second, remember that big companies can get knocked off by
smart competitors who start from scratch with long, long odds
of success. MCI is doing extremely well against ATT. Federal
Express is doing extremely well against the US Postal Service.
Compaq computer company is doing extremely well against IBM.
The Discover Card is doing extremely well against MasterCard
and Visa. Even Robert Allen did extremely well against all the
other real estate books and seminar operators that I leap
frogged over in the 70's and early 80's. New technology and
super charged marketing can deal a mortal wound to your
competitor. Just because they've been around for 100 years
doesn't mean you should go back to your day job.
You should read the book "Positioning: The battle for
your mind." by Trout and Ries. Great book. It will teach
you how to position your "David" product against a
"Goliath" competitor.
When you are done positioning, your product must be better.
Emphasize your competitive advantage in such a way that makes
your competitor's product appear obsolete. MasterCard did this
with American Express. "It's everywhere you want to
be." Their ads showed how American Express is not
accepted everywhere.
"When you absolutely, positively have to have it
overnight." Just saying that emphasized the fact that the
US Mail was a dinosaur and that Federal Express was the new
pony express. People were willing to pay 50 TIMES the price of
a first class stamp just to get their information 3 times
faster.
To gain a competitive advantage, your information must be,
faster
cheaper
smaller
simpler
easier
more efficient
prettier
more secure (guaranteed)
more features
better value (combining features)
better design
better service
more advertising
better advertising
more available
Step Seven. Create your ad.
As I said before, marketing is the key. Having determined
your competitive advantage, you have to create advertising
that causes people to ACT! I go into great detail on this
subject in my advanced course on Info-Preneuring (Call
1-801-852-8700 for information.) We cover the following
information:
Advanced Impact Marketing: One Powerful ad can make you a
fortune.
How to get your message across in the overcrowded
airwaves.
How to get your customers to beg to do business with you.
Ethical strategies for persuading anyone to buy from
you-NOW!
Breakthrough results: 10 ways to double your ads response
rate.
You ad should emphasize the Ultimate benefit your product
promises. What is the amazing miracle cure your information
can provide? Dr. Jeffrey Lant, one of the leading experts in
selling Information Products says that some of the major
Ultimate Benefits are:
Financial Stability
Health
Love
Security
Salvation
Self-regard
Community and peer recognition
Independence
Sexual fulfillment
Beauty/desirability/ personal attractiveness
The headline of your ad should promise an Ultimate Benefit
as well as your competitive advantage. The copy of your ad
should describe as many other benefits as you have space to
describe. Of secondary importance in your ad are the features
of your product.
What is the difference between benefits and features?
Features describe your product. Benefits are what your
customer gets when they use your product. When you talk about
your product, you are doing "feature" selling. When
you talk about results, you are "benefits" selling.
For example, when airlines want to sell you airline tickets
to Hawaii, how do they do it? Do they describe the kind of
aircraft you'll be flying in? Do they brag about the airline
meals? Do they describe the leg room? Or do they show you
pictures of palm trees, sand and sun? Palm trees are benefits.
Leg room is a feature. You'll get more people to Hawaii with
palm trees.
Features are for the head. Benefits are for the heart.
Features are about logic. Benefits are about emotion. Emotion
will outsell logic ten to one. Logic may be an important part
of the sale...but only after you have engaged their emotion.
There is a lot more about marketing than I can cover here.
It is, in fact, a lifelong study. There are shortcuts,
however. Tricks that we pros have learned. Words that can
double sales. Phrases that can cause your phone to ring off
the hook. Strategies that can cause people to beg to do
business with you...as impossible as that might sound to you
now.
When you see me speak to an audience, you will see people
literally leap out of their seats to do business with me.
After speaking for many years, I have discovered and perfected
a scientific set of principles that cause people to take
action immediately. These principles work EVERY TIME! I hope I
can have a chance to share this information with you
personally.
Step Eight. Rent your target data base for a limited test.
When your ad is done, you are ready for the test. Start
cheap. Try regular newspaper classifieds or on-line data base
classifieds. Cross your fingers. Let's hope your phone never
stops ringing.
Step Nine. Test until you find a message that pulls at
least a 1% response.
What makes the Internet so perfect for information
marketing is the free classifieds. There are thousands of
places where you can place your free classified and test the
response your ads at ZERO cost. It’s incredible. But even
classifieds in normal daily papers are relatively inexpensive.
And once you discover an ad that pulls, you can run it in one
of 7,000 different newspapers.
Step Ten. Test many different media to see which is most
productive
Try newspapers, try magazines, try periodicals, try
newsletters, try the Internet. Some will produce gushers of
cash flow. Others will be dry holes. It may take months of
testing to discover which is which.
Step Eleven. Roll out your marketing campaign in a major
way.
Step Twelve. Test other Ring 2 versions of your winning
info-product (ie. CD-ROM, newsletter, seminar, etc.
Once you have a winning ad for a winning product and you
have rolled out your marketing campaign, it is time to start
strategizing the next versions of your information. If you'll
look back to the 5 Rings of Riches, you will see that there
are 22 ways to sell your information in Ring 2. Ironically,
each different version of your product will have a different
price range and will reach totally different audiences. Just
like hard cover book buyers are totally different from
paperback book buyers, so are CD-ROM buyers different from
audio cassette buyers. And happily, some of your regular
customers may want to have your information in several
different formats...one for the car, one for their CD player,
one for their computer, one for their night stand, one for
library, one for their telephone, etc. If they love you and
your information, they're going to want all of you they can.
Well, that about covers the broad subject of Info-Preneuring.
I've tried to touch all of the bases and give you the big
picture. There's much more to learn but this should give you
enough information to convince you that you should jump into
this with both feet.
One last word of advice. On my office wall I have a sign.
It says,
I make money by writing words. The more I write, the more I
make. Therefore,
Write 1000 words today!
I have calculated that whenever I write a word on a
page...like this one...and get it out to a customer...like
you... I eventually make $20 per word. If I want to eventually
bring in a hundred dollars, I write five words. One. Two.
Three. Four. Five. There, that was $100. If I want to make
$1,000, I just write 50 words. 500 words equals $10,000 and so
on.
Why do I make so much money for every word I write? Because
every time I write a best-selling book, it is placed into tens
of thousands of bookstores. Every time a book sells, I not
only make the 15% royalty of the cover price of the book
(usually about $3 per book) but I have secret ways of
capturing the name of the book buyer...who now becomes part of
my Info-Funnel...who now is offered more of the products I
have lovingly created for him or her...who then tells three or
four friends about me...who then go out and buy my book...who
then get enticed into my info-funnel...who then, go tell their
friends...and so on, and so forth. So that every word I write
eventually results in somebody sending me money...at least $20
for every, single word.
So, you see, I don't get writers block. Ever! Whenever I
have to make a decision about whether to watch some worthless
T.V. show or to sit down at my computer and write my 1000
words today...my computer always wins the battle.
If you knew that you could make $20 a word, wouldn't you be
more motivated to write your 1,000 words right now.
Why are you still reading?
Get writing.
(P.S. My computer just did a word count in this special
report. There are 10,189 words. This is good. Very good.)