Advancing Your Writing Career: Where do You Go Beyond Hubpages? Part 3, Creating Knowledge Products

The third part in this series explains the benefits of furthering your writing career with knowledge products, also often called information products. I personally prefer the term knowledge product, because it implies that you are developing the content based on your own knowledge, as opposed to regurgitating information found elsewhere on the internet. Knowledge product creation is, perhaps, the most involved way to advance your writing career, but also the most potentially rewarding.

Many people may choose to make this a step further down the road after a content website is going strong, while others may choose to build an entire business around a good knowledge product. Please take a look at Part 1 and Part 2 for more details on advancing your writing career, and the purpose behind this hub series.

Please take a moment to answer the question at the end of this hub once you’ve finished reading, as this helps me know what kind of information will be the most useful for you. Without further ado, logical option number three for advancing your writing career beyond Hubpages.

Knowledge Products

A knowledge-based product is the ideal for profitable income, and for having a valuable offering for both your customers and potential affiliates. Simply put, a knowledge product is anything you create based on your knowledge, experience, and expertise. This could be an eBook, book, training course, manual, or other similar product. Especially if you choose an electronic format, knowledge products are something that can be used and built upon indefinitely, and have no upside cap on potential earnings.

• Additional skills. Aside from having writing skills, you will probably need to develop a specific schedule or outcome-related deadlines. Knowledge products are often a very large undertaking, and having the discipline to develop and complete the product is often astronomical. You will also either need to learn how to outsource certain tasks, or be very good at editing, proofreading, and formatting your own work to where it’s easy to read and nicely polished.
  
  Next, you will have to learn how to do market research. This is a big one, but not as daunting as it may seem at the outset. Essentially, it’s a process of discovering exactly who falls within your ideal market, then asking them questions to determine what they want in a knowledge product. You then take that information and create the product. This is a great opportunity for pre-selling, or essentially selling the product before you’ve created it, allowing your audience to have an active part in its creation at the same time that they’re financing its development.

• Investments. Obviously, properly researching and developing a knowledge product takes a big time investment, and may also require some financial investment for website hosting, domain registration, advertising campaigns, and the software required for developing professional PDF documents. In addition, knowledge products can be done in other formats, including audio and video. These will require additional equipment and software. Outsourcing the work that isn’t in your area of expertise will also require some financial expenditure, but with the right research or pre-selling, this cost can be paid back quickly – possibly even before the product is complete.

• Returns. The initial expenditure is the only major investments that have to go into this product, and after that – except for some ongoing marketing, and replenishing any physical product -- it’s all profit. In electronic formats, any number of your product can be sold without ever depleting the supplies, and without ever needing additional production from you. These products can range anywhere from a $20 eBook to a training programs that sell for thousands of dollars.

• How you can use Hubpages. The very essence of pre-selling is to get people involved, and to really get in touch with your audience to ensure that you’re delivering exactly what they want. Hubpages is a great place to present some of your ideas and get feedback from others, which can also help you get clarity on who is in your ideal target market. Ask questions, offer simplified versions of your ideas, and you may be surprised what kind of feedback you get back. Once you’ve started marketing the product, you may be able to use Hubpages to raise awareness and drive traffic to your site.

Now that you’ve read this hub and, hopefully, the entire series, I would really appreciate your feedback on just one more question. Think of the single biggest frustration or fear you have related to advancing your writing career. What is happening because of that fear or frustration?

I hope these hubs have been helpful, thank you for sticking with me through this series. Please feel free to post any additional questions you have about your career as a writer, at any stage, on any one of these hubs.