Internet Marketing of Information Products - How To Get Started

As a beginning internet marketer, I was inundated with numerous offers on the internet to buy this information product and that information product. And I was getting emails every day from the internet gurus offering some "must have" information product. Somebody must be making a lot of money. I wondered, "How do you get into the game?"

By reading this article you will learn why information products make sense, how to figure out what to write about, how to write your ebook, how to write your sales page, and what you need to get this online.

Why Information Products

Ebooks are great for your online business. They can be sold standalone for good profits or they can be used to promote your other services and products. Or you can do both at the same time, promote your business and make money off the ebook through the monetization your marketing process. And once you have developed your information product, you don't ever have to pay to reproduce it. There are no recurring costs. There are no production or duplication costs, no inventory costs, and no shipping costs. And you don't have to be around to sell them as everything about the sale and download to the customer can be automated. This could be the dream "autopilot business".

Let's run through some numbers. If you sold 10 ebooks a month for $77 each, that would be $770 in your pocket monthly or $9,240 per year. If you sold 20 ebooks per month that would be $1,540 per month or $18,480 per year. If you sold 50 ebooks per month that would be $3,850 per month or $46,200 per year. And if...I think you get the picture. Don't forget, once you have done one ebook, you can produce another one and generate a whole new stream of income.

What To Write About

The key in figuring out what to write about is you need to figure out what is going to sell. Your first inclination is to figure out what you are interested in and then write an ebook about that. Don't do it! You need to figure out your target market or niche product before you invest the hours into developing your ebook.

You need to brainstorm profitable ideas. Here are some ideas as to how to do that.

1) Market analysis on Clickbank Marketplace. I'll let Clickbank tell you what they are all about. "Founded in 1998, ClickBank is the Internet's premier retailer for digitally delivered products. From ebooks to software, we offer customers a vast array of digital goods. ClickBank is the pioneer in selling digital products worldwide through the leverage of over 100,000 talented and proven affiliates. We provide a highly secure, scalable, and fraud resistant environment for e-commerce. ClickBank has quickly become a global leader in the sale of digital goods online with more than 10,000 product publishers and over 100,000 registered affiliates. Each day, ClickBank completes nearly 20,000 orders from more than 200 countries around the world. ClickBank.com is consistently ranked as one of the most highly trafficked sites on the internet." So we are going to use Clickbank to help us figure out what products people are buying. Go to http://www.clickbank.com/marketplace.htm and you should see a box that looks like this:

Pick the category that interests you. You have a choice of Business to Business, Health & Fitness, Home & Family, Computing & Internet, Money & Employment, Marketing & Ads, Fun & Entertainment, Sports & Recreation, and Society & Culture. You can then sort the products by popularity. This will give you a list of the products on Clickbank in your chosen category listed in the order of popularity with the most popular at the top. Take a look at the different products and click on the top ones to get an idea as to what those products are all about. That should give you some good ideas as to topics for profitable ebooks.

2) Go to your local magazine store. Take a look at your local newsstand. Popular topics will be served by more magazines. Scan the various headlines on the covers. You can get ideas for ebooks from these sources. And you can do your research for your ebook from the magazines themselves!

3) Go to Amazon.com. Search on Amazon.com's bestseller list for non-fiction books. This will give you ideas as to what is popular. And you can also drop into your local Barnes & Noble store or other brick and mortar bookseller and look at their bestseller racks and shelves for ideas.

4) Google search. Once you have narrowed your topics down or even if you are still brainstorming, do a Google search for your topic of interest and look for forums that cater to that topic. So for example, if you were going to write an ebook about photography, do a search on "photography forums". Once you get to the forums, see how active the forums are and how recent are the posts. You can probably get some more ideas from perusing the forums. Another Google search you can do is to Google search your topic. On the right hand side of the page will be Google Ads and some of them will be information products. Somebody is paying money to present those ads so there is money to be made with those topics. Do research on those products.

How To Write Your Ebook

Now that you have your topic, you can start the ebook writing process. The main reason you are writing your ebook is to solve the problems of your target market as they pertain to your main topic. In your research of your topic, such as magazine articles and forum posts, you will have come across questions and problems that are recurring to your target market. Make sure you write those down as they will become the basis for the outline of your ebook. It is important to prepare an outline as this will form the framework for your ebook, making it easier to write, and also help you with the next step which is putting together your sales page.

For your outline, you should have your main topic, your main questions or problems which will make up your chapters and the minor questions or problems which will make up the subtopics in your chapters. Once you have the outline done to your satisfaction, start writing to answer all the questions and problems you wrote down. I know this is vast simplification of the process but this will give you a good start.

How To Write Your Sales Page

The sales page is your page on the internet which is going to sell your ebook. For examples of sales pages, you can go back to Clickbank and click on the products that you used for your initial research. Each of them will have their own sales page. With your original outline for your ebook at your side, you can start to put together your sales page. This is the basic structure of a sales page:

Headline. This is the text that initially captures your customers' attention. This usually will include some pretty bold claims for the ebook.

Introduction. The introduction provides some background for the product and describes the need or problem in such a way that the customer is agitated and you create a need in the customer to have that ebook.

Solution. This is where the ebook is described and how it will solve your customers' problems. This would include a list of benefits.

Testimonies. This is where you provide testimonies of customers who have benefited from your ebook. It is important that you have testimonies to give your product credibility. If you need to, give away copies of your ebook or offer it cheaper at the beginning in exchange for testimonies until you have testimonies.

Offer. Make your offer and ask for the sale. Provide related bonuses as extra kickers for the sale.

Guarantee. Everyone wants a guarantee as it gives them a way out if they have buyer's remorse. (Most people who are unhappy with the product usually don't bother with trying to get a refund or they forget. But be prompt with any refunds if they are requested.)

Call to action. Here you have your conclusion and your order button.

P.S. You may want to provide them a second chance to buy your ebook with another order button. Doesn't cost you anything - you might as well do it. Some people need to be asked more than once.

Other Things You Will Need. You will need a webhost to host your sales page, a domain name which will be your address on the internet, and you will need a way to process the sale. For the webhost for a one-page sales page, the monthly cost should be very low. You might even get that bundled in with the domain name registration. Speaking of domain names, you should get a domain name for yourself to legitimize your business as a real business. For processing the sale, the easiest way is to set up a Clickbank account or similar account and link that into your sales page.

So there you have it. If you follow this outline you should be able to get your product online, write a sales page, write the actual ebook, and know what profitable ebook topic to write about. I left out the marketing side of the equation but that is a whole other huge topic in itself.

C Doug Mah is an internet network marketing coach whose goal is to teach independent business owners how to use attraction marketing and Web 2.0+ technologies to grow their businesses profitably. Going beyond the old school techniques that are still being taught by some network marketing and MLM organizations, these techniques drive pre-qualified prospects to your business, allowing you to spend more time in business building and training instead of prospecting and recruiting.

If this article raised your interest level, join me, C Doug Mah, to learn more about internet marketing and in particular, internet network marketing.

.