The beauty of virtual and information products is that they have a high perceived value and a high profit margin. They cost very little to produce, but you can sell them for what the marketplace will bear. The additional power of virtual products is that you can sell to a thousand people as easily as you can sell to one. You put a downloadable product on your Web site and then sell it as many times as you like with very little cost involved.  

In order to sell a virtual product, you mainly need some way of taking payments. You can use services like PayPal or ClickBank for this. Paypal will let you sell either real or virtual products while ClickBank is for virtual products only. Paypal will also keep track of recurring subscription payments for you whereas ClickBank does not. The main benefit to Clickbank is that people do not need a Paypal account to pay. They can use a regular credit card. Also, Clickbank has an affiliate program that automatically keeps track of people selling your virtual product and pays them for you.  

You can also look into getting your own merchant account and billing people yourself. This method is a bit more time intensive on your end, but you have control to sell either products or services and allow people to pay with major credit cards.  

Virtual products utilize what I call the multiplier effect wherein you create once and sell many. For example, if you give a teleclass (a class given over the telephone) you can charge people to attend the class. You can record the class and make it available on CD or via download from your Web site. You can also transcribe the class into a book or ebook and sell it that way. You’ve created the material once, but you’re selling it many times, to many people in many ways.  

To build a bullet-proof business, you want to use the multiplier principle as many times as you can. In this chapter, we’ll talk about ways to repackage the same information and distribute it to the public.  

Please note that throughout the remainder of this chapter we’ll be discussing things that take some technical expertise to perform. This chapter is not intended to be a how-to technical manual on publishing or Web design. My intention here is to give you a cursory overview as to what is available to you. If you have a bit of technical savvy, then this chapter will point you in the right direction so that you can be off and running. For those who aren’t technologically endowed, there are experts who can help you with the nitty-gritty details of programming or design. My purpose here is to tell you what’s possible, so you’ll know what direction to take and what questions to ask when you interact with a programmer or designer. Visit www.elance.com to find technical experts who will bid on your project.  

Self-Publishing

It may take some additional software or technology to make your books, CD’s, videos and ebooks look professional, but self-publishing is a great way to test new products and get them to market faster than going through traditional publishing channels. A traditional book publisher could take 6 to 18-months to release a book. If your information is time-sensitive, it could be obsolete by the time it gets to print. Also, traditional publisher’s pay only a small percentage to the author – around 9%-10%. Self-publishing offers larger profit margins.

The primary benefit to going with a traditional publisher is that they can get your book out to a larger audience through their distribution channels. They also may hire a publicist to help you get press coverage. But, you’ll still have to do a lot of your own marketing. If your book doesn’t take off within the first 90 days, they may cut their losses and spend no additional time or money on promoting it.  

If you decide to self-publish, you’ll first want to determine the format – electronic or printed.  

Ebooks  

Electronic versions of your book have several benefits which include:  

• They have very little cost associated with them.
• Thousands are as simple to sell as one.
• Fulfillment is instantaneous and doesn’t require labor on your part.
• There are no shipping costs.
• You can literally make money while you sleep!

 The drawbacks to ebooks include:  

• Not everyone is willing to read a book online or print it themselves, so you could miss out on sales by limiting yourself to only an electronic version.
• There are several ebook formats, and you may need to learn to produce versions in Adobe, Palm Pilot and for other PDA’s.

Creation  

Assuming you’ve got your ebook written, the next step is to save it into the format(s) which can be read by others. Adobe Reader is the format of choice for most desktop computer users. Microsoft Reader is common for PDA’s and many people have Palm Pilots.  

Adobe Format  

To create an Adobe PDF file that can be read by Adobe Reader, you’ll need the Adobe Writer software. This software costs in the $200 range, or you can go to the http://www.adobe.com site and click the link for Create Adobe PDF Online. They’ll let you create 5 Adobe files for free and then they have a service available where you can pay $9.99/month to create as many as you want.

If you’ll be creating printed books or need more versatile desktop publishing features, consider purchasing Adobe PageMaker and the Acrobat Writer comes with it. Sometimes you can find individuals selling a PDF Creator for very low prices on EBay. So start there.  

Microsoft Reader  

Many PDA’s will read Microsoft Reader. The software for creating Microsoft Reader files merges itself into your Microsoft Word program and looks like a little green and brown tree button on your menu bar. You can download this software at http://www.microsoft.com/reader/downloads/pc.asp

The free download is also available for Pocket PCs, too: http://www.microsoft.com/reader/downloads/ppc.asp 

So, you’ll create your ebook in Microsoft Word, and then click the little tree icon that MS Reader puts on your Microsoft Word Toolbar and follow the prompts from there.

Palm Pilot  

To create a file that can be read on a Palm Pilot, you’ll need your book stored in a text file with special markup codes for bolding, underlining, centering and italicization. You can view your books in Palm Reader format on your desktop computer.  To create the Palm Reader document, you’ll need a program like DropBook which is available as a free download at

http://www.palmdigitalmedia.com/dropbook .  

You don't need a Palm Pilot to view your books in Palm Reader format on your desktop computer. You just need their software for your desktop, which is available for free at http://www.palmdigitalmedia.com/products/palmreader/trial  

Delivery

Assuming you use either Paypal or Clickbank to sell and deliver your ebook, the process is fairly simple. You’ll store your ebook on your Web site and then set the Paypal or Clickbank “thank you” page to automatically take the customer to a Web page on your site where they can download your ebook in their format of choice. Make sure you give them links for where they can download the Adobe Reader, Microsoft Reader or Palm Pilot software. If you manually process orders, you can always have a standard email you send to people once their order is processed that tells them where to go to download the ebook. Or it could have the ebook attached.  

Printed Books  

Your first step when creating a printed book is to obtain a block of ISBN’s. ISBN numbers are sold in 10-packs for around $225. You get them from http://www.isbn.org . Once you assign an ISBN to a book, you’ll need to add it to their online database. When you apply for your ISBN’s, they’ll give you a username and password for their site where you can add your book(s) to their database. Once your book is added, it will automatically be listed in Books In Print – a catalog that bookstores use to order books. This way, if someone goes into a bookstore and asks for your book, the average bookseller can look it up and order it.  

The next step is finding your printer. Traditionally, you would have to do a print run of several thousand copies which would cost thousands of dollars, but today, with print on demand, creating a paperback book is faster and cheaper than ever. You can print one, ten, twenty or hundreds of books quickly and without tying up all your money in inventory that may or may not sell.  

The best place I’ve found for print-on-demand is http://www.Lightningsource.com . They do high quality work, delivered quickly and economically. They will produce paperback, hardback or electronic books for you. You give them your book text and cover in the appropriate Adobe PDF format and a proof will be in your hand in about a week! For a printed book, I’d recommend finding a professional artist to do your cover and have them deliver it to you in PDF format so you can send it directly to LightningSource. A good book cover design will cost you between $100-$300 - possibly more if you must pay a photographer for reprint rights on any artwork.  

I use Adobe PageMaker to layout my books and create the PDF’s that LightningSource needs. LightningSource gives you instructions and templates for book designing in the Book Designer resource area on their Web site.  

For about $100 you can have your book set up with LightningSource and from there you may print as few or as many books as you’d like. An 8.5x5.5 paperback with a full color cover and about 224 pages inside will run you around $4.35 to produce. Of course, you could produce the same book for around $2.00 if you used a traditional publisher like Morris Publishing, but you’d have to have a thousand or more printed at once.  

I’ve submitted digital files of my books to LightningSource and literally had a stack of books delivered to my door within two weeks. Orders after the initial setup take only about a week to receive.  

If you’re on a tight budget, are in a hurry, or you just want to see how sales go before you invest thousands of dollars, consider print on demand.  

Distribution  

The hardest thing for most self-publishers is getting their books in bookstores. Major publishers actually buy shelf space in bookstores, so little guys have little or no possibility of receiving shelf space in a traditional bookstore – much less prominent placement. But it is possible to obtain virtual shelf space on Amazon, Barnes & Noble and BooksAMillion’s Web sites. The great thing about LightningSource is that they are a subsidiary of Ingram Book Sellers and your book is automatically distributed by Ingram and Baker & Taylor. This means that once you create a book with LightningSource, you’re automatically going to be listed on Amazon, BarnesandNoble.com and BooksAMillion.com!  

With appropriate marketing, you can also get shelf-space in smaller bookstores because almost everyone purchases from Ingram or Baker & Taylor. In the Christian market, Spring Arbor is the major distributor and since they are a subsidiary of Ingram, approved Christian titles will also be distributed by Spring Arbor.  

Anytime Amazon or any other Internet or brick and mortar bookstore sells your book, they purchase from the distributor (Ingram, Baker & Taylor or Spring Arbor) at the wholesale price. The distributor fills the order and cuts you a check approximately three months later based on your total sales for the month. You don’t have to touch the books or tie up any money. Everything is handled through the Distributor and the Bookseller and you just wait for your check.  

Interesting Note: Did you know that you could actually get on the New York Times Best Seller List without your book being in brick and mortar bookstores?  Get enough publicity – radio, print and TV promotion – and send people to Amazon or BarnesandNoble Online and those sales will count toward the New York Times Best Seller list!  Once you’ve hit that, you know every bookstore in America will want your book on their shelf – self-published or not!

 Online Memberships, Subscriptions and Communities

When developing an online membership or community, the most important thing to consider is your target audience. Who will use your member area? Will they be doctors, lawyers, teachers, corporate executives, antique car enthusiasts, quilters, crafters, auto-shop owners, computer trainers, moms, dads or step-parents? Get specific. Going broad is actually a death sentence. If you want more members, you need to focus. People want a membership that’s specially designed for them.

By focusing on a defined market niche, you do two important things:

• You make marketing easier. You know exactly who to reach and methods for reaching them become clear.
• You make the customer feel special. A transmission shop owner will purchase a membership in a community for transmission shop owners much faster than they would purchase a membership in a general small business community. They have specific needs which they want addressed that can’t be answered in a broad forum.

Next, you need to decide what information, products, services and resources you will provide for your target audience. We’ve touched on some things you can include in memberships, subscriptions and online communities, but here are a few more ideass: 

• Message boards for people to exchange ideas with each other.
• Member participation – allowing them to add articles, ideas, poems, press releases, links, books, profiles, blogs, etc.
• Ebooks, special reports, software, audio files, and other informative resources.
• Directory listings and/or advertising on your site and other sites that reach your customers’ prospects.
• Advice, support and assistance.
• A Web site within your community.
• Email discussion list they can participate in.
• A package of products and/or services that you have to offer.
• Membership card and/or certificate.
• Discounts and coupons.

Payment Options

Always give people a couple payment options. Over the years I’ve tried billing monthly, quarterly, semi-annually and annually. The ones I’ve settled on are a monthly option, a 6-month option and an annual option. Auto-billing is easy if you use Paypal’s subscription features.

Tip: If you use Paypal, it takes them about three working days to transfer money into your bank account. So if you need your funds faster, apply for one of their debit cards. It’s a Mastercard that pulls directly from your Paypal account. You can’t spend more money than you have, but it’s a great way to instantaneously access your funds in your Paypal account. You can use it at a teller machine or like a credit card.

 Member Access

 The trickiest part of an online membership is giving people access and/or revoking their access whenever they quit.  There’s a couple ways to go. You can program a system that gives each person a unique password and allows them to add information to their profile and other features on the site. I programmed my own membership system in Cold Fusion – a programming language that bridges the gap between HTML Web pages and a backend Microsoft Access or MySQL database. There are also membership modules available for PHP Nuke that you might explore.

If you don’t know how to program and don’t have the money to hire a programmer, your hosting provider may have a way for you to set a password protected directory and assign passwords for that directory. When someone joins, add their username and password to the directory, and then if they quit you can remove it. If you have a control panel with your hosting provider, look for a “Web Protect” option where you can set up these passwords. Once the directory is protected, only people who enter a valid username and password may access it.

Leverage the Power of Viral Marketing

Web sites that encourage people to tell other people about them are “viral” in nature. They spread automatically without as much need for marketing and education on your part. The best way to leverage the power of viral marketing on your Web site is to center your Web site on the visitor. Make it all about THEM. No one’s going to pass along a Web site that is all about a stuffy corporation or you bragging on yourself. But if you make it about the visitor – give them their 15 minutes of fame so to speak – then you have a winner.

Sites that do this are ones like LoveStories.com where visitors can post their poetry and then tell their friends to come read it. Blogs (web logs) that allow individuals or businesses to post their thoughts, ideas or latest news in a diary style format are a viral marketing tool. IdeaMarketers.com allows anyone who visits to post their articles and then encourages them to tell their friends to come read it with a link for “Refer a Friend” on every article page.

With viral marketing, you don’t have to toot your own horn, because your visitors will do it for you.  

Postcard sites are of course viral in nature because in order to read a postcard from a friend, the visitor has to come to the postcard site. If you can create something so cool or ingenious that people want to tell their friends about it, you’ll have another winner. An example of this is the “Interview with God” www.TheInterviewWithGod.com site or funny joke sites that encourage you to share them with friends and family.

Any page that makes the visitor think, “Oh, man, Jane’s got to see this!” is a winner. Make sure you have a “tell-a-friend” script on your site so that it’s easy for visitors to share your site with others.  

Teleconferencing  

A teleconference is when you have three or more individuals on the same phone call. Typically they are held on what is called a “telebridge” where each person calls into the same phone number and perhaps enters a special PIN number to join in the call. Everyone may talk at the same time – like an old-fashioned “party line.”  Generally, there is one “teleleader” who conducts the call and keeps everything in order.  

Teleconferences or telecalls have multiple uses ranging from research and development to marketing to actually being a product in and of themselves.  

Research and Development

If you offer an informative free “class” to help educate your prospects and clients, you’ll have the opportunity to interact with your customers and find out what they need. They may have ideas for improving your product or service that you never thought of. After all, they are the ones actually using it! They will know what’s missing. Every time I’ve talked with someone who has read one of my books, I ask them two questions. First, what was your favorite scene in the book and why? Second, if there was anything I could change or do different to make the book better, what would it be?  I’ve gotten some really great answers from this which have helped me to improve my writing skills.  

By asking customers what they like and don’t like about your product or service, you will find out what makes your product or service unique and desirable to customers. It will help you pin-point what to emphasize in your marketing. Also, you’ll learn ways to improve your product to hold on to customers longer.  

I’ve also used teleclasses to help me come up with titles of books. You can teach the same teleclass with two different titles for the class and draw a drastically different number of attendants. A title can make or break the success of a book, audio series or the attendance at a teleclass. Teleclasses are a great way to test both titles and advertising headlines.  

Recording Teleclasses

You can purchase a little gizmo at Radio Shack and hook it up to a tape player and a phone line and record your teleclasses. Or you can purchase a card for your computer to directly record your phone calls into a computer. There are also little pocket size recorders that you can carry with you and plug into a phone line to record a call. But, if you want the highest quality, go with the one that directly records to your computer.  

If you’re not a techno wiz or don’t want to do it yourself, there are people who will do this for you and put your file into MP3 format or burn it to a CD. There’s a lady who works with Teleclass International who does this – http://www.teleclassinternational.com .  

Once you have a digital file of your teleclass, you can burn it onto a CD and either give the CD’s as bonuses when people buy your products or your consulting services. Or you can sell them as products. You can also put the audio files on a Web site and sell access to them. This way there’s no burning of CD’s. People just download the files to their own computer and then either play them from there or burn them onto their own CD’s.

Audio Podium  

Eagle Conferencing ( http://www.eagleconferencing ) offers a service called Audio Podium, and I’m sure you can find it from other telebridge providers. It is basically like a voice mail box that lets you record up to a two-hour greeting. With this greeting, you can record a message, a class, a tutorial, or whatever you want that lasts up to two hours. People then call in that number anytime they want and listen to the call.

I currently lease two audio podium lines. One of them I use for a presentation about the network marketing company I work with. My team can 3-way people into this presentation so that they don’t have to explain the business themselves but can let me do it for them -  24/7. The other line, I use for SheLovesGod. In the 2004 SheLovesGod Virtual Women’s Conference, I recorded a different lesson on the 7 Laws of Abundant Living each day of the week. People could call in each day and listen to a different lesson. The next morning, I changed out the lesson, and they could call in again for the next lesson. I had a friend record these for me using her digital recording device, and we have them available as MP3’s for download in the BelieversAtWork member forum.

The uses for the Audio Podium service are only limited by your imagination!

BYOAudio.com

www.BYOAudio.com offers you a way to easily stream audio from your site. You can record the audio on your own computer and upload it or you can call into a phone number the y assign to your call in line and they'll create the MP3 for you. It's fast, easy and affordable, although it doesn't work well for recording telebridge calls that have a lot of people on them. When the people hit buttons on their phone, it can end the recording. But it does work well with 1-3 person calls where you can control what buttons people push on their phones. 

For-Fee Classes  

Many people charge for their teleclasses. They offer valuable information in their classes that people are willing to pay for. If you are serious about conducting teleclasses, I would highly recommend taking the teleleader training at Teleclass International  http://www.teleclassinternational.com . I have been through their training myself and it is excellent. They also offer ways for you to market and promote your teleclasses to paying customers. Not only that, but they’ll even handle your enrollments for you, collect tuition and pay you after deducting a modest processing fee.  

Many people use a free introductory class to lead into a paid one. You can whet their appetite with a taste of what’s to come, and if you handle it right, they’ll enroll in the full class to learn even more. The trick is not to give them too much in the free call, but you shouldn’t make it simply a sales pitch either.  

Educating Your Customers  

Sometimes you might have a product or service that is a bit technical. If your customers or prospects understood and knew more about it, they’d love it and never give it up. But if they don’t fully understand it, they might get frustrated and quit using it. In this case, a teleclass is a great way to educate your customers and prospects. You could either offer live telecalls, or you could simply record a tutorial on an audio podium and let them call in when they want to hear it. Or you could record the tutorial to an MP3 file and let them download it.  

Where Can I Get a Telebridge Line?  

Telebridge lines used to be very expensive and people would lease them quarterly or yearly, but now you can get them for free! FreeConference.com offers free teleconferencing. You set up a free account with them and log in and schedule a day and time for your class. You can then set the system to send out invitations for you. Or you can send them out yourself. This system works fine unless you have large numbers of attendees (say 100 or so). If you have a call with that many people on it, you might need to consider paying for a line that can handle higher numbers of callers.  

FreeConference.com also offers the ability to give people a toll free number to call into so that they don’t have to pay long distance charges. Of course, you bear the cost for this service.  

Another service that offers a dedicated free telebridge number that you can use any time without scheduling it is ThePacketCenter.com. I acquired one of these numbers and use it for team calls for my network marketing team. And of course, you can purchase dedicated telebridge and Audio Podium lines from EagleConferencing.com as well.

I would recommend using the free services until you find that you need the functionality offered by the pay services.

Continue on to Chapter 4: Advertising Revenues and Affiliate Programs
Back to the Table of Contents

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